Exposed
by Child of Loki
Summary: Backless dresses, pepper spray perfume bottles, country club weddings, ex-boyfriends, the mafia, and terrorists... What should have been a nice break from work leaves Nell feeling exposed in a number of ways... sparky pre-ship Nell/Callen
1. Part 1, Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA or its characters…**

**Author's Note (Updated in May 2013): I started this having only minimal familiarity with the characters (season one, part of season two, beginning of season three at this point), but Nell was too cute to resist playing with… By the time you are reading this, I'm completely caught up with this series. so any mis-characterizations in the later chapters are entirely my fault.**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 1: The Dress**

**Chapter 1: In which Nell contemplates what she sees in the mirror...**

_Not bad._

Nell Jones cleaned up pretty nice, if she said so herself. Maybe a little _too_ nice. Or rather, nothing at all to do with _nice_. The dress was inarguably classy, elegant even. But _clingy_. It hugged her body almost like a second skin. Okay, that perhaps was an over exaggeration. Its wasn't some latex, spandex superheroine cat suit, after all. It just cupped her breasts like an annoyingly handsy date, draped softly over the curve of her waist, the fabric like gentle fingers playing lightly over her skin, hugged the round of her hips and ass, and flared femininely a few inches above the knee.

Oh, and it had no back.

Okay, it had a back. But said 'back' consisted of a knot of the halter at the base of her neck, its ties floating down and tickling her bare shoulder blades and spine, and the scant portion of skirt covering her ass and thighs but not much else.

Nell Jones was not used to apparel without a back. What on earth had made her choose _this_ dress? Was it that it was the only item that looked 'quality' in her price range? Or perhaps, was it that secret part of her, that resided in every woman no matter how timid or low her self esteem, that wanted to look more than pretty, to be gorgeous, appealing, and maybe just a little bit scandalous? Or was it how nicely the muted dusty rose color brought out a natural glow in her otherwise pale complexion. Not that she need worry about her paleness in that company, Nell thought. Normally, she stood out in California, especially in LA, where everyone was golden tan. But the wedding she was about to attend was comprised of mainly the old elite, which had treasured delicate looking women since before the 'War of Nothern Aggression.'

She chuckled quietly, feeling the anxiety of being so physically exposed and outside her comfort zone evaporate as she recalled the crazy characters that comprised the Worthington family. Pretentious, yes. Yet still somehow fun and easy to be around. If it was just Trisha's family, Nell wouldn't feel apprehensive at all. But it was practically a certainty that the guest list for the wedding was well over 200 strong...

She sighed, pulled a face in the mirror, and set about make-up. Going without would have been as much a faux pas as showing up in daisy dukes with a man in grease-stained coveralls and missing some teeth. Or, god forbid, going without _hosiery_! But don't overdo it, either. Nell wasn't much one for make-up; neither was her own mother. However, Trish's mother, Mrs. Claire Worthington, had taken upon herself to educate both her teenage daughter and her socially naive best friend the intricacies of 'putting on one's face'.

Frowning, Nell decided concealer was probably necessary to cover those dark rings around her eyes. They'd been as busy as a silversmith at the fool moon. All the loonies and predators they'd gone after in the past few weeks... She could've sworn she heard a collective sigh when Hetty announced the team was off active duty and would be catching up on the paper work for the next week. For their field agents to look happy about paperwork... it had been one hell of a month.

There, Raccoon Nell went into hibernation. _Do raccoons hibernate? _She shrugged off the thought as she applied the subtlest rose eye shadow she could find, and relented to using the eye liner (there was no sense in ignoring the fact that she could make her eyes movie star gorgeous if she wanted). A hue of lipstick only slightly more vibrant than the natural pink of her lips and _voila! _she looked like she might be naturally this pretty...

No one was naturally pretty like they were with make-up, not even movie stars. Except, maybe Kensi. That woman was just plain gorgeous, and not in the aloof way that made you want to rip all of her hair out. She was smart and funny and badass. And Nell admittedly had a girl-crush on the woman when she first started working here. She wanted to be her friend, she wanted to _be_ her.

Well, she could settle for friend. And Nell was comfortable enough with who she was, even when her dress had no back.

She took a deep breath as she reached for the ladies' room door. This would be the test. Nell actually had found Hetty's request that she come in for at least a partial day of work a relief. If none of her coworkers screamed, laughed, or vomited at the sight of her, she would feel safe enough to plunge into massive gathering of the rich and critically snobbish.

* * *

**A/N: Bit of a slow/short start, but I do have a more complicated plot in mind, if I get that far… I'm also feeling like it might lean towards some Nell/Callen sparky-ness. Or should I try to keep it a straight up, Nell-centric team fic?**


	2. Part 1, Chapter 2

**Author's Note: Firstly, thanks for the feedback. :-) Secondly, this fic_ is_ going to be about Nell, but for some reason, it wants to be in Callen's head a little bit, too…**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 1: The Dress**

**Chapter 2: In which Nell shocks her coworkers…**

A woman in a very clingy... _backless _dress walked by the field agents' group of paperwork-laden desks. Agent G. Callen just happened to be reaching up for the next form on the Mt. Everest of papers currently composing his inbox and caught the flash of pink and white from the corner of his eye. He picked up his pen, ready to attack his next victim, but set it down as his brain processed the signals from his eyes. His head jerked back up.

It was Nell Jones, their adorable, quirky little intelligence analyst walking in the opposite direction of ops, where she normally lived while at the office. In a _backless_ dress. The white had been the expanse of her porcelain-like skin exposed to the world at large. And maybe his sense of reality may have become rather warped by the endless stream of reports and bureaucratic forms, but Callen was quite certain she had not shown up to work that morning looking like she's just left a private box at the Kentucky Derby. Yes, that dress had country club hobnobbing written all over it, from the non-audacious color to the clean, elegant lines, to the complete lack of a back.

But _why?_

Callen shook his head, forcefully flinging the curiosity to the recesses of his brain, and tried to buckle back down to work. A few minutes later he realized he was never going to get through the form justifying the appropriation of a cotton candy cart for apprehending a terrorism suspect. And not because any reasoning, however logical it had been at the time, sounded completely ridiculous on paper. No, it was Deeks' progression from fidgeting, to muttering, to jostling Kensi beside him and engaging her in heated whispers. He focused on the exchange for a moment to learn that they'd noticed Nell's aberrant attire as well.

"C'mon, Kens, ask her why she's all gussied up."

"If you want to know so badly, why don't _you_ ask her?"

"Because then she'll know I noticed, and she'll think I'm hitting on her, and I don't think of little Nell like that."

"Uh-huh."

"I don't."

"She's female. And her dress has no back."

"I am aware of the backless state of her apparel, thank you, Kensi. But you're avoiding my point. _You_ are a _girl_. You can ask her without any threat of sexual harassment suits."

"At least you've now recognized that everything out of your mouth is a sexual harassment suit waiting to happen."

The conversation degraded from there into Kensi asserting that she was not going to pry into her coworker's personal life and Deeks sulking and whining. Callen felt his own curiosity peaked once more and shifted to look around the mountain of paper obscuring his view. Nell was over at Hetty's desk. They were conversing intently but extremely congenially.

_Maybe Kensi can read their lips..._

He didn't catch the thought in time to realize he was as bad as Deeks. But instead of shrinking back behind the wall of red tape, Callen got up and stretched. Deeks and Kensi had already given up the pretense at work and were leaning with their backs against their desks, blatantly staring at the two women across the room.

"What's the big deal?" Sam's deep, smooth voice interrupted all three agents open gawking. "So Nell's got something better to do than sit around all day filling out and filing reports."

Sam leaned back in his chair, stretching his arms over his head and cracking his fingers.

Callen smiled. He may seem all cool and uninterested, but he knew his partner well enough to catch that glint of curiosity in his eye.

"What's Hetty giving her?" Deeks asked unnecessarily.

Across the room, Nell exclaimed happily and sat down in one of the chairs before Hetty's desk. The older woman walked around and draped a string of pearls about the analyst's neck, fastening it securely.

Apparently, Deeks could no longer stand the mystery, and called across the building in a clear tone. Being Deeks, it was more playful than 'I want answers' but was none-the-less successful in providing them.

"Hey!" Deeks said. "Why does Nell get the day off _and_ jewelry and we're stuck writing reports over and over again like the bad kids in detention?"

"Because, Mr. Deeks," Hetty said in that tone of voice that was not shouting yet carried to wherever she wished to project it. "Miss Jones is well-behaved. I would think twice before defacing the side of a public building again."

"I did that to protect my cover."

"Down with _The Man_?" Hetty folded her arms across her chest. "Are you not presently working for the so-called _Man_, Mr. Deeks? In fact, in this particular situation, would you not be considered _The Man_ for persecuting some of the 'oppressed masses'?

Deeks shrugged sheepishly, but was not required to further defend his case (at least verbally... who knew how far the slacker had gotten through his report) because Nell had taken the time to approach the agents.

"I can tell you're all burning with curiosity," she said. No one responded, since the answer was obvious. Or maybe it was that they did not hear her words. Callen certainly found himself distracted by how different this Nell looked compared to the image he had of her in his head. Different. But completely the same. Her smile was the same bright smile. Her eyes were the same big, round, little girl eyes. But _more_. More round, more expressive. Not so little girl innocent. And that was the crux of the difference, wasn't it? Nell had always fallen into the _girl _category of his mind, sweet and cute. Standing before them now was Nell the _woman_. Some observational genius, he was. Those were skills he needed for survival, and yet he had completely failed to fully evaluate a person he came in contact with every day. Callen felt a little bit ashamed. What else had he overlooked?

"One of my closest friends growing up is getting married today," Nell said.

"On a Tuesday?" Deeks asked.

"Rich," Sam and Callen both said.

They looked at one another and smiled. Sometimes partners brains really were too in sync.

Deeks shook his head. He didn't understand.

"'9 to 5' doesn't really register with the extremely wealthy," Kensi said.

"Oh! _stinking_ rich," Deeks said, sagely nodding his head.

There, again. Callen had pegged her for 'socially shy, control freak, computer obsessed techie'. But obviously, she had some strength to her in order to face down the upper crust in their own venue. Sure, he'd mingled, charmed, and battled numerous of the wealthy, but he'd always had the facade of a false identity. Nell was going to face down the sharks as her self, as naked and exposed as that ridiculous dress left the smooth skin of her back vulnerable.

"You look gorgeous, Nell," Kensi said.

"Thanks." The younger woman's alabaster skin turned pink as a blush spread over her cheeks. Well, Callen hadn't been completely off base with his analysis of her. Somehow, it didn't make him feel better.

"So, who has the honor of escorting our little Nell to this joyous event?" Deeks asked.

Nell frowned, her smooth brow furrowing slightly. It was obvious that the thought of bringing a date to the wedding had never occurred to her. Oh, the thrilling social lives of workaholic federal agents...

"It was sort of a last minute thing," Nell said. "We were so busy, I wasn't even sure I'd be able to go."

_Little liar_. Her delivery was good. But her audience was better. None of them called her on the bluff, however, considering the states of their own personal lives, or lack of them, as it were.

"May I offer my services, then?" Deeks asked, offering his arm in a mock gentleman's gesture.

"No you _may _not, Mr. Deeks." Hetty's sudden appearance made all of the agents under her supervision jump. She pointed at the natural disaster that was the detective's desk. He opened his mouth, obviously to protest that Nell was being allowed to escape for some fun, but the older woman cut him off. "Nell has completed her work. However, the four of you..."

Hetty trailed off, crossing her arms in front of her chest and giving them the gimlet eye. As per usual, Callen felt a brief flash of guilt and fear upon the emergence of 'Bosswoman Hetty', followed by a flush of embarrassment for reacting like that to a diminutive, elderly woman. A glance at his colleagues, all wearing similar admonished expressions, however, vanquished any notion that he should be ashamed for being intimidated by Hetty. For they all knew Hetty was _scary_.

And so they also all knew that it was time to wrap up this little break and get back to work. It had been an intriguing (rather baffling, and a bit unsettling, if he was honest) diversion, but bureaucracy called...

"Well, I had better get going," Nell said turning to leave. She didn't get far, however, before Eric appeared at the top of the stairs. No whistle to get their collective attention, though. Instead, he called his partner's name and proceeded to dash down the stairs.

His exuberance was palpable until he was finally face to face with the young woman and his brain seemed to stall on him.

Eric obviously had not seen Nell in what Callen knew they'd be calling _the dress _for weeks if not months and years afterward. (Office teasing was good for moral, at any rate.) The computer geek stuttered a bit before finally finding the words which had previously sent him running after his friend.

"Your..." Eric cleared his throat. "Your hat."

He handed her a white sunhat sporting a ribbon the precise shade of her dress. Yup. This wedding was certainly being held had a country club, Callen decided.

"Thanks," Nell said. Either she was being gracious or she really didn't notice how they all were staring at her dumbstruck. "I would forget my own head if wasn't attached, sometimes, I swear..."

"Um... bye?" She tried after a few awkward beats of silence. Callen caught himself staring at her shoes, of all things! How rude and unguarded was that? But they were heels, about 3 inches high, and Nell's movements had been as smooth and certain as ever, like she always wore nude, closed-toe stilettos that perfectly blended with her nylons (definitely wearing pantyhose, for the supposed 'nude' shade was a bit darker than her skin's naturally creamy complexion, as evidenced by the backless dress).

"Have fun," Kensi said, apparently the only one able to recompose themselves. Callen found his eyes trailing after the stilettos as she walked away, the round firm curve of calf rippling beneath the skin as she moved. Physically stronger than she first appeared, too. Boy, did his observation skills need a refresher course...

"See you tomorrow," Sam said.

"That is, if you don't have too much fun," Deeks said.

Nell waved, laughing, and disappeared around the corner.

The four agents immediately turned to one another, concern on all their faces.

* * *

**A/N: Sorry this is taking so much set up to get to the fun bits… Promise there will be drama, action and etc. **


	3. Part 1, Chapter 3

**Author's Note: So… this story is taking a little more setup than originally anticipated, but hopefully it's not too boring/part of the fun?  
**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 1: The Dress**

**Chapter 3: In which Callen attempts to give Nell 'The Talk'**

"So, who's going to give her 'The Talk'? Deeks asked, giving voice to what they were all thinking. "Kensi, I'm looking at you. Girl-to-girl sort of discussion, isn't it?"

"I don't do 'girl talk'. I just... I don't," Kensi said.

"Well, me neither," Deeks said. Kensi rolled her eyes. How often had she complained to the others, both behind Deeks' back and directly in front of him that her partner always wanted to have heart-to-hearts on stakeouts.

"Nell's a grown-ass woman," Sam said. "No one has to give her 'The Talk.'"

Callen looked at his partner. Again, the big man had given voice to Callen's own thoughts. And just like Callen, he could see Sam didn't quite believe the assertion, either.

"And even if someone did need to say something to her before she left for that Richie Rich wedding," Sam said. "It wouldn't be me. I'm only giving that sort of talk once in my life, and I'm saving it for my daughter."

Almost entirely synchronized, the agents turned to their computer tech. The blonde, bespectacled surfer dude-looking young man was closest with the female analyst. Unfortunately, he was still standing there staring after where Nell had disappeared, his mouth slightly ajar. Apparently, the reboot operation hadn't taken to his brain yet.

Given that Nell had walked towards the staff lockers rather than directly to the parking lot, Callen estimated that they had a few minutes before such concerns they all held would be forced to go unvoiced. However, they'd been bickering too much. And someone would have to take action soon. Because if on the off chance, something _did_ happen to Nell and they hadn't even given her a 'be careful' let alone 'The Talk', none of them would ever forgive themselves.

"I'll do it," Callen said. He edged around a pile of papers on the floor that had avalanched off the side of Deeks' desk, but was stopped by Kensi before he got farther than her slightly more tidy work space. She had been rummaging through a desk drawer and had produced a fairly impressive array of kit on top of the coffee-ringed sheaves covering her desk. A taser sat beside what looked like a fountain pen but Callen knew to contain a stiletto blade, and a perfume bottle. He furrowed his brow at the novelty of the last item.

"Give these to Nell," Kensi said. "Make sure she takes them with her."

"Um... Kens..." Deeks said. "Where precisely is she supposed to store that arsenal. She was carrying a clutch, wasn't she?"

They all looked at Deeks.

"What?" he said. "So I know purses? I sold knock-off Prada on the street as a cover once."

Kensi's hand hovered over the items as she chewed her lip contemplatively. She settled on the perfume bottle.

"So in case of emergency, Nell can smell like 'Naomi Campbell Cat Deluxe With Kisses'?" Deek asked. Kensi glared at his sarcasm.

"Try Eau de Self Defense," Sam said.

Callen smirked. "Mace?" he asked.

"Pepper Spray," Kensi said.

Deeks flinched.

"Watch her," Kensi said. "Make sure she puts it in her..." she looked pointedly at her partner, who still seemed to be reliving a very unpleasant encounter with something similar to the contents of the faux perfume bottle. "..._clutch_."

Callen nodded and walked briskly off to find Nell. She was probably already out of the building. Maybe she was gone. Part of him hoped she would be, and not just because he'd been the one elected to give 'The Talk'. They were overreacting. Most assuredly. It was just difficult for them to think of Nell being somewhere unprotected and vulnerable to the world at large when they were used to finding her safe and sound, holed up with Eric, watching their virtual sixes. She was one of their team in a type of life that made them all think of the world as 'us' and 'them'. Nell was one of 'us'. And Callen had a particularly uneasy feeling about the 'them' with whom she was about to cavort.

There. Auburn hair. Backless dress. Killer heels. Little Nell All Grown Up.

He caught her up, startling her slightly at his appearance.

"May I walk you out?" Callen asked, taking her arm and urging her forward before the confusion wore off enough for her to object.

He waited until they'd cleared the building and stepped out into the bright California sunshine before he spoke. Well, before he tried to speak, anyway. It was a difficult conversation to begin. Had he been in a persona, it would've been easier. The problem was that Agent Callen, Team Leader Callen, Concerned For A Team Member Callen was no act.

"Kensi wanted you to have this," he said, pulling the 'perfume' bottle from his pocket.

The look on Nell's face was as clear as the blue sky above their heads. _Kensi wanted her to have a bottle of perfume? Kensi Blye? Badass, tough as nails, superagent Kensi Blye? _That_/ Kensi?_

Callen smiled.

"It's Pepper Spray," he said.

"If it's all the same..." Nell dubiously examined the small disguised weapon but did not move to take it from his hand. "I think I'll pass."

Callen took her hand (so small and delicate, he'd never really realized) and placed the 'perfume' in her palm, wrapping her fingers around the bottle.

"She was insistent," he said.

Nell gave him a bemused look but took the little can of pepper spray and gingerly placed it into the small white purse she had tucked under her arm.

"I don't see why she made you track me down this minute to give it to me," Nell said. Her big eyes searched his face, requesting some sort of explanation for the odd behavior. This was it. No more delaying.

Callen looked away, swiped a hand over his face and turned back to Nell. He took her elbow again and urged her to start walking towards her car.

"We care about you, Nell. You're part of our team. We... just don't want to see you get hurt."

She stopped short and turned towards him, chin stuck out defiantly, and a flare of obstinance in her eyes.

"I'm just going to a friend's wedding," she said. "You know, a _wed-ding_. A happy occasion, a gathering of friends and family in celebration of the love two people have for one another. The way you're acting, you'd think I was shipping out to Iraq!"

Callen didn't respond to her antagonistic, defensive attack. She had every right to be annoyed by their meddling. But there was this nagging feeling of unease he had whenever he thought of her lost amongst the ungracious, often caustic and cruel wealthy. Instead he reigned in his disgust as he thought of some particularly nasty characters he'd encountered within the set she was about to join for a supposed 'fun' time.

"Nell." He spoke softly, respectfully. "We're sure your friend and her family are wonderful people. They'd have to be to earn your love."

The young woman blushed. It was rather adorable, making her look even more girlish despite the cut of that damned dress. If the 'cute' factor was a defense mechanism designed to engender protectiveness in others, Nell was absolutely the fittest for survival. Because Callen only wanted to protect her all the more for the inadvertent show of innocence and vulnerability she displayed over the compliment he'd given her.

Focus, G.

"I'm assuming that this is going to be quite the affair?" he asked.

Nell nodded.

"And you won't know even half the guests."

Not a question, but Nell nodded 'yes' again.

How to put this without giving offense or sounding like a paranoid father sending his daughter off on prom night.

"The wealthy are just like everybody else," he said. Nell gave him a 'why are you wasting my time, I already know this' look but patiently said nothing, waiting for him to get whatever it was off his chest already.

"Some are good people," Callen said. "And some… _aren't_."

Nell looked as if she were about to cross her arms and tap her toe like a teenage girl receiving the 'don't do drugs' lecture she'd only heard about a hundred times already. She also seemed somewhat amused about _who_ was giving her such a lecture. Callen pinned her with a serious gaze and the small smirk left her lips.

"And Nell, when they're bad, they're _so_ much worse than the lowest thug on the street. Because they know their money can buy them out of any mess."

"Not everyone can be bought," Nell protested, her earnest, trusting gaze locking with his. He fought the urge to smile, to be distracted from his point. It was heartening to have someone like Nell believe your team of government agents were as incorruptible as the shining silver star of a sheriff's badge in a classic Western. But it also showed just how naive she could be.

"No, but the bad guys only need to think they're above the law, that they can't be touched," Callen said.

"Callen," Nell said, giving his arm a reassuring squeeze. "I know. I'm a big girl. And I can handle myself."

Callen nodded, wondering whether she really _did_ understand his point, hoping he'd gotten around actually giving her 'The Talk' that they reserved for female agents going out into the field, the ones who'd been trained and taught but never really _told _what to expect. Nell was the product of a post-feminist world, one in which equality was the norm. Even knowing the attitude of some of these rich malfeasants, was she _truly _aware of how much more wary she needed to be? That, however disgustingly unjust it was, she was by default more of a target simply for being a woman? Not to mention those big, innocent eyes and overall vulnerable impression of her physical presence. And,

"Nell, that dress..." he said.

"...has no back," Nell finished, her big eyes no longer looking so innocent, but wistfully sage. The jaded edge to her expression tore at his heart a little. The quirky intelligence analyst had always been a bright spot, a small ray of unblemished light. And god knew the dearth of such purity in his life. He would've liked to have held onto the ideal, even knowing it could never be as simple as he had led himself to believe. Because Nell was a person, not just some pretty scenery along the road for him to stop a moment and admire from a distance, to forget the trials of his journey and dream of the peace there. And just because she looked so young and innocent did not mean she was so naive and defenseless.

Callen walked her the rest of the way to her car, opening the driver's door of the mini cooper for the female analyst. Somewhere along the way, despite being tossed from home to home, he'd learned manners. And Nell was most certainly dressed like a lady. Even more compelling to his gentlemanly training, she _was _a lady.

She got into the little car that was so very _Nell_ it still made Callen smile. Cute and sporty; green with white racing stripes.

"Thank you," she said, and he wasn't sure whether she meant to show gratitude for his gentlemanly gesture of opening the car door, escorting her out of the building, or the attempt to express the entire team's concern for her.

"Have a good time, Nell," he said, closing the door. "You deserve the break."

He kept the smile on his face as he watched her pull out of the parking space and drive away, all the while still feeling the nagging unease in his gut. Why had he overreacted so badly to her dressing up and attending a wedding? More telling, why had everyone else? Logic would conclude they were ridiculous, that there was no basis for their concern. But he had learned to listen to instinct over the years. So as he headed back into the building to face more unending paper work, Callen scoured his mind for some explanation as to his gut reaction.

He found none. Yet the feeling of unease did not go away.

* * *

**A/N: Why is everyone so worried about Nell going to this wedding?! **


	4. Part 2, Chapter 1

**Author's Note: Perhaps, a bit short. But it was a good breaking point. **

**P.S. I took liberties with Nell's background/family that I don't know are accurate/wrong… but since I in essence kidnapped these characters for the sake of writing this fic… maybe I won't apologize for it. :-)  
**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 2: The Drink**

**Chapter 1: In which Nell meets up with an old acquaintance…**

The wedding ceremony was beautiful. Laid out in a part of the vast country club grounds that looked specifically manicured for fairytale weddings, with a lane of great old oak trees leading to a white gazebo that looked as if it were made of lace as it sat upon the edge of a placid pond with a surface like mirrored glass reflecting the blue sky and the green foliage. And nothing cheesy, like releasing doves, or ice sculpture fountains.

But who would expect any less from the Worthingtons, despite the fact that the family on the whole looked down upon Trish for relocating to California. Virginia, after all, was where they _belonged_. It was obviously an expensive affair; the whole country club had been rented out, as well as the associated hotel (a room for each guest, whether or not they required it) for the entire two days. Because yes, the rich tended to get just as inebriated at weddings as her mother's Irish Catholic family. There tended to be less brawling and more verbal and emotional assaults in this set, however. And Nell knew which was the more damaging to a person.

Her family members might break into the odd wrestling match or fistfight over some perceived offense, but it was never really meant and considered all in good fun. And inevitably, within minutes the pair of miscreants would be sharing a congenial pint, laughing and slapping one another on the back.

But not with these people. When they attacked, it was cold, calculated and vicious. They would strike through you with a simple remark 'Oh, you _chose_ to wear that color? How very _daring._' 'Your fiancé is an _intern_ with Cooley & Kindling? Now where is that law office located again?' And in so doing, effectively cut your heart out.

But that didn't begin until the reception. And Nell didn't care which distant relative or business associate's trophy wife looked down their noses at her. She was there for Trish and her immediate family, the one that had taken into their society the awkward new 'Yankee' girl all those years ago.

So what if she clapped and hooted raucously as the newlyweds made their exit down the aisle? That's how her family did it. Of course they were reserved and respectful throughout the ceremony, most of them having the fear of God put in them by their catholic school upbringing; stern nuns with menacing rulers and all. So that was the same anyway. When a man of God was performing the Good Lord's work, you were quiet and respectful. But should you not show your joy in His creation? Nell was not what you'd call 'religious', but she had been brought up in the catholic culture, and she just couldn't understand why protestants treated everything like a funeral (well, perhaps not a good analogy, considering some of the funerals she'd attended) or a science experiment. No. No good. Scientists could be quite exuberant when-

"Buy you a drink?"

Nell started, barely stifling a yelp. She'd been stuck in her own head for who knew how long as she stood off to the side in the shade of one of the ancient oak trees, watching but not observing the guests mingling about the highly manicured lawn.

She was even more startled to recognize the man who'd interrupted her reverie. He was a good foot and change taller than her (but who wasn't?). with dark hair done in rakish style. He had a handsome face with a good jaw line, lips just slighter than what would be called 'full', captivating green eyes and a dimple in his right cheek as he smiled lopsidedly at Nell.

_That goddamn dimple._

"Jack," she said, knowing she sounded neither as cool, nor as collected as she hoped.

The smile broadened on the face of Mr. Jonathon Howard Worthington, the _third_ (consecutively anyway- there were probably God knew how many before someone decided to break with the tradition a few generations ago). The seemingly innocuous dimple deepened. That dimple had broken many a heart.

Nell almost snorted and walked away that very moment.

"Well, how about I buy you that drink?" Jack tried again.

"It's an open bar," Nell said, proud to have put a seriously sarcastic edge into her voice that she was not accustomed to. Playfully sarcastic, yes. (Eric could attest to that.) Cruelly sardonic, however, was not really her thing.

"Then I'll buy you two," Jack said. His green eyes twinkled at her.

"Wow," Nell said. "You really haven't changed at all."

"Come on, Nellie." He gently grasped her elbow. Not a move intrusive enough to warrant a reaction, but enough to give him some control over her. Oh, she knew his games.

"Are you just going to stand here looking like the book worm at Spirit Day?" he asked, putting her in her place without any overt cruelty. And with that, Nell absolutely _knew_ her high school boyfriend hadn't changed at all.

But she had.

She wasn't a timid pushover any more. Even a few years ago, she would have been smart enough not to fall for his charm, and would've likely outright refused his invitation. But now she knew she was confident enough to handle his company without being swayed or hurt by his little games. Besides, Nell had obviously been feeling a bit lonely, dwelling upon her own family gatherings as she'd been when he approached her. It was a given that the bride's time would be demanded by everyone there, and Nell had already gotten her few minutes to congratulate Trish and her new husband, Will. She could claim some more time later, but for now the bridal party was off doing the photographs and Trish and Will would have to make after dinner rounds at the reception... The minutes would grind nearly to a halt without some sort of entertainment. And Jack would certainly provide that, even if she already knew his playbook.

"Fine, I'll buy you that drink if you promise to stop pouting," Nell said. Jack's expression was far from pouting. He never pouted. His confidence never seemed to waver. Jack Worthington was always in charge. Or so he thought.

_And let him think it. _

Nell smiled in mock sweetness.

"Not necessary, dear Nellie," he said, opening his suit jacket enough to reveal a highly polished, sleek flask. He winked. "I come prepared."

"What? The club's bar isn't good enough for you?" She asked, already knowing the answer, for the old Virginian family were connoisseurs of their whiskey. Probably because their origins could be traced back to moon shining Whiskey Rebels in the early days of the colonies or some such rich and colorful history.

"Or I'm not good enough for it," he said, grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. "Let's just say we decided it was best to terminate our relationship. But no reason you can't be friends."

Maybe Jack was an arrogant, self-centered piece of work, but he had always made her laugh. She took his proffered arm and they made their way towards the outdoor patio bar, presently serving champagne in honor of the recent successful nuptials.

* * *

**A/N: Can Nell handle her ex…? What other mischief is brewing at this fancy wedding…? Will Callen and the rest of the team get dragged into this little romp of mine…? ;-)**


	5. Part 2, Chapter 2

**Author's Note: So, Nell might seem a little bit out of character, but there's good reason for it. Okay, there's at least **_**a reason **_**for it…**

**...oops! almost forgot... WARNING: Harsh language.**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 2: The Drink  
**

**Chapter 2: In which Nell is intoxicated, hides in a cupboard, and ruminates on satchels and pretty eyes...**

"Oops."

Nell giggled as she reached down to recover the white clutch she'd inadvertently knocked to the ground whilst reaching for the champagne flute. There was a severe rush of light-headedness as she picked up her small purse and sat back up. The world spun a lot more than its normal, undetectable turn about its axis.

_Nell, you are drunk_, she thought.

But that wasn't right. It couldn't be true. She was always careful to pace herself with alcohol. Her frame was petite and she didn't drink often or much, being always aware of how hard it would hit her if she didn't pay attention.

And she'd only had two glasses in the last... Nell tried to check her watch but the numbers on the tiny clock face downright refused to come into focus. Okay. Don't panic. The last she knew, Jack had brought her the second glass of champagne and it'd been forty minutes since her first.

"Nell?"

Green eyes concernedly searched her face when her companion finally got her attention. _Those goddamn green eyes. _Worse than that _goddamn dimple_, if you asked Nell.

"Sorry," she apologized, forcing her brain to sit still. "My mind was elsewhere. What were you saying?"

He smiled that goddamn perfect smile of his.

"I was noting that you don't wear any rings on those pretty little fingers. And that you're here on your own."

Took him long enough to get around to the point. He'd been trying to charm her with small talk for the past, well... however long it'd been... And while she allowed herself to pretend Jack had no ulterior motives, it'd been a pleasant conversation.

"I, too, am unattached," he said. His hand stroked Nell's bare arm, traveling up to her shoulder, and then back down to her elbow, leaving tingling sparks in its wake. "Why don't we keep each other company tonight?"

Heat blossomed in her belly and face, but she knew the knot in her throat indicated how she really felt about the proposition. And bizarrely drunk as she was, Nell also knew that had she already fell into Jack Worthington's 'Conquests' list, he wouldn't have even bothered saying 'hello' to her. The only reason he was laying his best charm (with a side of extra dimple) on her now was because she'd never gone all the way with the self-centered, gorgeous jerk back in high school. Oh, she hadn't been innocent by any means. They'd messed around, but Nell hadn't been ready for the whole shebang.

_Ha! Bang!_

Nell giggled.

Apparently, Jack took her girlish response as confirmation she were interested in his proposal, for he leaned in and kissed her. It wasn't tentative or chaste. It was _hungry_. She felt his greed to possess her pour into her through the contact, flooding through her in a burning wave, destroying every feeling and thought that refused to go dormant in an act of self-preservation. There was nothing but the sensation of his mouth on hers, his hands on her face and neck, the heat of his body.

And a recalcitrant, whispered echo.

_And when they're bad, they're _so_ much worse..._

Nell jerked her head away from Jack's not so much tender as voracious embrace. The handsome features of his face painted the portrait of a startled, confused man.

"Going to the Ladies'," Nell said, rising to her feet a bit unsteadily. Jack's expression turned from one of bemusement to lustful facetiousness. His green eyes were startlingly dark and vibrant.

"Is that an invitation?" he asked.

"No," Nell said firmly, and then walked confidently away. Okay, maybe not so much confidently as staggeringly. Maybe she should ditch the heels, but this wasn't the type of wedding in which one kicked off their shoes. At least, not yet. Perhaps, in the wee hours of the morning, when only the die-hard young people were left, they'd be dancing barefoot in the elaborate ballroom to the songs that had been played at their high school dances, recapturing a youth that was aged like fine wine even though it originally had been no better than the stuff that came in a box.

Nell strode gracefully up to the lobby desk when she finally made it into the main building. At least, in her mind, she was purposeful yet graceful. But even uncommonly intoxicated as she was, Nell knew she made no such visage. Doubtless, she looked like the tiny drunk woman in heels too high and a dress too revealing (what the _hell_ had she been thinking) that she was. Or worse, she looked like an inebriated teenager after Prom.

"Ladies' Room?" she asked, keeping the words to a minimum in fear of slurring them. The desk clerk was the consummate professional and only showed the slightest twitch of brow in judgment of her state.

"Down the hall and to the left," he said, pointing in a direction off to Nell's right. "Do you require any further assistance?"

How sweet of him to ask.

"It's my job, miss."

Had she said that aloud?

The young man smiled and winked.

"And my pleasure," he said. Ooh! Not so cold as he first appeared. And cute, too.

Nell smiled.

"Well, thank you," she said, focusing hard so as not to sound as drunk as she felt. "But I think I can manage."

There was more sway in her step than usual, and she wasn't sure it was intentional. Or maybe there was more sway in the world than usual. Steady on, Nell. Almost there. See. A doorway coming up on the left. No need to reach out for the wall to steady yourself.

She stumbled through the door and cursed.

Not the bathroom.

It was dimly lit by a single small window, and covered in dark wood paneling. And... there were thick metal bars, polished brass running along three sides of the small room. A few of them had empty wire hangers dangling lonesomely on them.

The cloak room.

Idiot!

Nell was about to turn, discreetly make an exit, and pretend like she had never wandered into the currently unutilized room by mistake when she heard footsteps coming determinedly down the hall.

Her heart sped up.

Had Jack followed her?

She really, _really_ couldn't face him, especially when the thought of a nice tumble between the sheets seemed more and more appealing. She hadn't had sex in such a long time, but Nell wasn't into one-night stands. She was too much of a control freak neurotic to expose herself to such an emotional rollercoaster. Because neither was she the type to be able to detach her heart from her physical needs.

Panicked, she scanned the vacant little room. Polished brass hinges caught her eye. Not wood paneling, but spare cupboard space for when the winter volume overflowed the capacity of the racks. She popped one open with a click. It appeared to be perfectly Nell sized.

She shook her head. This was ridiculous. She was being ridiculous. Was she seriously going to hide from her ex-boyfriend in a coat check cupboard just because he was coming on to her and she didn't feel like she had the will at the moment to turn him down?

The footsteps stopped outside the door.

Nell dove into the cupboard, closing it just short of its latch being set. The exterior door handle rattled and then there was the rumble of a man's voice.

It wasn't Jack.

And whomever it was, wasn't alone. Trying to focus on the specific words was like trying to hear a wave crashing on the shore while a tempest raged around her (or as it were, inside her head). Nell knew she should just step out of her hiding place and excuse herself, because it was rude to eavesdrop. But how embarrassing would that be, popping out of a cupboard, completely inebriated? Not to mention _Special_ Agent Callen's annoying warning ringing in her ears. There were some who wouldn't think twice about taking advantage of a petite, blatantly intoxicated woman falling out of a dark cupboard into an out-of-the-way cloak room.

Oh, but she did have...

Applying the few brain cells not drowning in alcohol, Nell carefully unclasped her purse, and probed its depths with her petite, currently less than dexterous fingers. Finally, her hand found the cold, hard cylinder she was searching for. Nell hesitated. This was ridiculous! Why was the world suddenly so ridiculous? And _unorganized_. She loathed unorganized. Chaos. She strove for order.

No, she would wait these men out. They'd never know she was there. Then she would find the bathroom... because she wasn't feeling so good. Her head was a mess beyond what two glasses of champagne should do and these men, one of which who sounded like a bear- Nell clamped a hand over her mouth to stifle the giggles. A bear with a... _Chicago_ accent? The giggles threatened to escape via her nose. But she managed to reign her silly self in. She was a professional government agent, after all...

It seemed like forever in the cramped, dark, way, _way_ too hot cupboard before the men finally left, heavy footfalls and the thump of the door closing behind them. She burst from the cupboard, falling and stumbling until she reached the wall opposite, which kindly stopped her ungainly progression to the floor.

Reaching up and wrapping unsure fingers about a much more sure bar of metal, Nell pulled herself completely upright. In that dizzying euphoric manner that accompanies being severely intoxicated, Nell thanked the coat rack for its assistance. Glancing up, which of course was inevitable because her head was already on an upward trajectory from thanking the metal bar and not likely to come down again, she spotted an anomaly. Not that she had been in a condition to observe much, but Nell was certain the storage space had been entirely vacant upon her initial entry into the space.

Now there was a cute leather bound briefcase sitting atop the high shelf above the rod meant for holding jackets. It had polished silver clasps that seemed to wink at her as the sun poured erratically in through the small window.

"Oh, hello there," Nell thought. Or said aloud. Which was (just face it) the same thing at this point.

It was a quirk of hers she tried to hide, because it was simultaneously a bit cliche for her liking and extremely odd. Nell Jones liked satchels. Purses were okay. She admired many of them in such a girly fashion that it embarrassed her. She might as well have a closet full of designer shoes for the way she could drool over a good handbag. But her ultimate weakness were attaches, messenger bags, and briefcases. There could be so much more mystery to them. Any woman knew what lay in any purse, that basic assortment of essential items ubiquitous to all female kind. But what precisely was contained in a WWII satchel like Indiana Jones' slung carelessly over some adventurer's shoulder? Or briefcases handcuffed to secret agents' wrists? Nell always expected to one day open one and be flooded with glowing light, Pulp Fiction style.

Those men, who had been accompanied by the Chicago-style talking bear, they had been talking about making some sort of deal, hadn't they? They must have stashed their paperwork in here. It was common practice amongst the wealthy elite to invite business associates and broker mergers and the like at family events, but really, right out in the open was a little bit in bad taste. No wonder they'd tucked the details away until they could find a more private venue to discuss matters with whomever they were there to meet.

But still, Nell was an intelligence analyst for a reason. She was nosy at heart.

Should she pull it down, try to open it?

...

The cold tile felt good beneath her thinly covered bottom. The wooden door of the bathroom stall thankfully solid as she rested her back against it.

Vomiting was Nell's least favourite thing in the world. Next to hairy spiders and Angelina Jolie movies (yes, any and all of them). But the Angelina Jolie thing, and the hairy spiders for that matter, could probably be linked back to the vomiting issue.

She searched clumsily through her clutch and found a piece of gum which she proceeded to pop in her mouth and chew, willing the mint to wash away the nasty burning acid taste in her mouth. And throat.

Closing her eyes, Nell tried to concentrate. Well, at least to prevent her mind from wandering as horribly as it had been for what seemed like an eternity now. Her mind disobeyed and wandered, anyway. But it did conjure up something rather useful. In a flash of memory, Nell recalled sitting through one of those god-awful, the-world-is-a-terrible-place lectures for college freshmen, and realized something horrible.

Shit!

Someone had slipped something into her drink, Rohypnol or GHB or whatever the hell was the current fad in slipping someone a mickey. And Nell could only think of one person it could have been, who'd brought her the glasses of champagne.

She was going to kick that fucking bastard's ass!

But it didn't make sense. Drugging his date (or 'target' seemed somewhat more appropriate) just wasn't Jack Worthington's style. It'd be like an avid climber jumping on a helicopter to achieve the summit of a high peak. If he couldn't bed a woman with his charm and influence, then there was no sport in it. He got off on how smooth he was. Asshole.

Then again, it'd been a few years since she'd even seen him last. And a person could change drastically in far less time.

She was going to kick his fucking ass!

Well, he _was_ Trish's brother. And it _was_ Trish's wedding day. And Nell really would rather not make a scene.

So... she'd find him and kick his fucking ass _tomorrow_.

But right now, she needed to get out of here, because her head was starting to ache from the concentration that the revelation required and Nell was pretty certain she wasn't going to be able to keep it together long. Despite having vomited, she still felt pretty good. That stupid, warm, pleasant drunk feeling, was rapidly starting to overtake her senses once more.

She needed out. She needed to... call someone. Yes. She'd call someone and they'd come and get her, and she wouldn't run into Jack Worthington. Because running into Jack was bad, because she'd kick his ass? Or make-out with him? God, didn't he have the most gorgeous _green_ eyes? Eyes were her goddamn weakness with men, weren't they just? Expressive brown. Vibrant green. Vivid blue.

Hold on, Nell. Call someone.

She pulled her phone out of the clutch, which she mused must have Time Lord science, because it appeared to be bigger on the inside.

Right. Phone a friend.

Nell giggled at the out-of-date pop culture reference.

First off, she thought of Eric. He was, honestly, her best friend. None of them had much of a life outside of work, except maybe Sam who had a family to ground him. For Nell, who'd relocated for the job, this was especially true. And Eric had become such a good friend, and cared about her. Maybe too much. No. That was a bad idea. He would _so_ freak out if she called him in this state.

No. Not Eric...

Oh, yes! Kensi! Of course. The woman was tough, decisive, and discreet. Nell might even manage to get away without another safety lecture, if she were lucky.

Nell bit her lip and took a deep breath as she focused on finding the right contact in her phone's memory. Just what she needed would be to dial her parents' number by mistake right now.

The phone rang five times, in which she began to fear that she'd have to figure out someone else to call, when finally the female agent picked up and Nell found herself vomiting words instead of nasty, poisoned stomach contents.

"Kensi-Thank-god-you've-got-to-help-me-I-ran-into-my-ex-boyfriend-and-he-was-coming-onto-me-pretty-strong-and-then-I-felt-light-headed-even-though-I-only-had-two-glasses-of-champagne-and-they-were-those-small-fancy-flutes-and-so-I-went-to-find-the-bathroom-but-ended-up-in-the-coatcheck-cupboard-with-a-bear-with-a-Chicago-accent-and-they-left-a-briefcase-behind-and-now-I-think-they-might-be-_mobsters_-and-I-just-realized-someone might've-tried-to-roofie-me-and-I'm-hiding-in-the-bathroom-Please-help..."

* * *

**A/N: Don't worry. More Callen coming up next. And more plot, I hope…**


	6. Part 3, Chapter 1

**Author's Note: I intended to update this fic at least once a week, but you know, life… This chapter didn't accomplish everything I wanted, but it would end up way too long, and you'd have to wait much longer for an update, so (since I already started this fic by breaking it up into parts and chapters for better manageability) here's the next installment...  
**

**(PS I know the majority of you wanted Nell to have called Callen by mistake, but that's just not how it played out in my head. Hope you enjoy anyway...)  
**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 3: The Call**

**Chapter 1: In which Callen contemplates paperwork, Kensi gets a mysterious phone call, and Eric is concerned…**

The end was in sight. Well, if one had x-ray vision and could see through an inch and a half thick stack of paper, then the end was in sight. Agent Callen had found his paperwork groove, and filling out forms seemingly on autopilot gave him the capacity to wonder exactly why a report had to be filed for every bullet the agents fired. He couldn't remember any such policy being employed by the CIA. Of course, The Agency wasn't a particular fan of a traceable paper trail in many of their activities. No, if Callen's suspicions were right, the excessive amount of bureaucracy in which he and his team were currently entrenched was due to that ever-debated lumbering giant, the Military Budget, of which NCIS fell purview to. If the Joint Chiefs could report that three hundred and _one_ million bullets had been used instead of just three hundred million, then maybe the next year, they'd be given the budget for four hundred million. Not that Callen was complaining. He _liked_ when the magazine he loaded into his SIG actually contained live rounds. Actually, his life and the lives of others often depended upon that fact. But still, couldn't they figure out a way to budget for his bullets without copious amounts of paperwork that crippled his trigger finger? Couldn't they just take his word for it? He could keep an accurate count. He was trained to do so, because if your ammo ran out before you expected, you could very easily be dead. And if that didn't work, Callen would even be willing to keep a tally by cutting marks into his skin like psychopathic murderer's death tolls. Just _no_ more paperwork, for the love of god!

Kensi's phone rang, saving Callen's thoughts from spiraling any deeper down the rabbit hole. The female agent answered and then stood to walk away from the other agents' desks as she listened and began to talk. Callen shrugged. Everyone had a right to privacy. It was difficult to remember that sometimes when your job every single day was investigative (in other words, to be nosy).

After about a minute or so, Kensi returned and began to gather up her things.

"Where do you think you're going?" Callen asked. _With your sidearm_. Because yes, Miss Kensi Blye, the surreptitious little move of sliding it from your drawer and tucking it in the waistband of your pants did not go unnoticed.

"You know Hetty's not letting any of us leave until this paperwork's done," Sam said.

"Unless it's in a body bag," Callen said.

"Which she herself put us in," Deeks muttered under his breath, his head bent over his desk as he scribbled ferociously at some unfortunate form or other. The rest of his comrades were gracious enough to ignore the detective's bad mood.

"Emergency," Kensi gave as way of explanation that didn't in fact explain anything. Sam raised an eyebrow and Callen felt his own expression shift to match his friend's.

Kensi sighed, as if they'd been harassing her for days to divulge details rather than seconds.

"I'm trying to be neighborly, okay," she said, her tone curt. The young woman looked away bashfully and spoke low as if it embarrassed her. "I agreed to help Ted and Laura take care of Mrs. Dixon's Lhasa Apso. Apparently, Mr. Wiggles made a run for it. Ted can't get out of his meeting and Laura had to pick up the kids from school and take them to soccer practice."

"Oh, dog-related emergency," Deeks said, perking up immediately. As was typically the case with the detective, any perceived melancholy or sulking was fleeting, and he was already smiling brightly, his blue eyes twinkling. Probably because the man had seen an out from Paperwork Purgatory. Callen would never openly admit it, but he did feel sorry for Deeks, who had to report to LAPD superiors and bureaucracy in addition to NCIS. Callen briefly wondered which governmental body got to claim the bullets the raffish blonde detective fired. It would have to be NCIS, Callen concluded, since they'd been supplying the ammo.

Finally surfacing from his contemplations of fiscal semantics, Callen caught the end of Deeks' rambling. Something about retrieving Monty to assist in the search for Mr. Wiggles. The detective was rising from his desk in anticipation, looking like a suspect who had just laid eyes on a conveniently unguarded exit.

"Sit."

Deeks immediately plopped back down into his chair with an audible 'thump' upon hearing Henrietta Lange's order. _Who wouldn't? _In her ninja-like way, the diminutive woman had appeared seemingly from nowhere.

"Explain yourself, Ms. Blye," Hetty said, turning to face the brunette.

And Kensi did so, giving their inscrutable superior the same bullshit story she'd given the rest of her team. Callen had to admire both the female agent's skill at lying and her gall for doing it to Hetty's face. He hadn't planned on calling Kensi out on the fiction, but he wondered if Hetty would. There was no way to tell by the older woman's impassive outward demeanor.

Callen had reasoned that although her partner would lie for no other reason than to get out of work, Kensi would not. The part about an emergency, about needing to leave was doubtless real. Maybe the neighbors she described were even real. But nothing else in her story was.

"Ms. Blye, I am disappointed to say the least," Hetty said when Kensi had finished her false explanation. "I would not have put it past the _others_..." At this, Hetty glared at the currently idle agents. Callen was proud that he did not visibly flinch under the admonishing stare.

"Hey, have I ever lied to you, Hetty?" Sam asked.

"Suck up," Callen said.

The Hetty-glare briefly settled upon Callen, and the Senior Agent-in-Charge felt a quick flash of panic. For once, Hetty's scolding scrutiny hadn't been directed upon him and he had just gone and ruined it. He glanced at Deeks who had uncharacteristically, wisely remained silent. No help there. After an uncomfortable moment, Hetty's attention reverted to the female field agent whose pants were apparently _on fire_. Because she was such a _liar liar_.

"I'll repeat my earlier directive," Hetty said. "For those of you whom seem to have suffered temporary hearing loss. _No one _is to leave until they've completed their backlog of paperwork. I know it's not as exciting as chasing down suspects. Or ruining perfectly good tuxedoes. Or shooting cutouts of circus clowns. Or '_tagging_' public property with anarchist slogans, _Mr. Deeks_. But I think you'll find-"

"Guys!"

Callen had seen their technical operator run down the stairs with a tablet PC in hand and an anxious expression on his face, but the thought of interrupting Hetty, or even looking away from the woman while she was lecturing was inconceivable. Callen felt like he was somehow in trouble as it was and hadn't dared worsen his circumstances by acknowledging the tech. The fact that Eric had interrupted Hetty only displayed how upset the younger man was.

"I think Nell's in danger," Eric said, seeming to not have seen the shocked expressions on the field agents' faces, or the much deadlier one of their boss. All of their expressions softened, however, upon realizing the genuine concern of the tech for his absent partner.

Callen felt the persistent unease that had plagued him all day coalesce into a knot in the pit of his stomach. Sam and Deeks looked like they were experiencing something similar. Hetty no longer appeared angry, which was definitely not a good sign considering the trouble they'd been giving her all day behaving like whining children. And Kensi... The woman looked uncharacteristically pale.

"She called you?" Kensi asked Eric.

The question seemed to throw him off from his focused panic.

"What?!" Eric blinked several times and shook his head. "No. Nell set today's batch of inter-agency updates running through her intelligence coordinating programs before she left and I think you guys need to see this..."

* * *

**A/N: What did Eric discover? Will Kensi divulge her friend's secret call for help? Stay tuned…**


	7. Part 3, Chapter 2

**Author's Note: So, exposition is definitely not my strong point. I hope that this chapter isn't too painful, however…**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 3: The Call**

**Chapter 2: In which Callen discovers why there's a knot in his stomach…**

"Marco D'Arcangelis?"

Callen studied the face in the photo that Eric had put up on the screen before them. It wasn't a straight-on mug shot or a full profile, obviously pulled from a surveillance still and enhanced. Specifically, he did not know the man. But he knew the type. A big man who has always been large, accustomed to everyone around him behaving submissively, acquiescing to his authority. And when they didn't... In short, a brute.

"He's affiliated with the Genovesi family in Chicago," Eric explained. "On the ATF's Most Wanted list for selling illegal firearms to the highest bidder, including extremist groups worldwide."

"A scumbag, sure. But why exactly is he on NCIS' radar?" Deeks asked. "And what does this have to do with Nell's safety?"

"It's believed that he also has been selling military secrets over the past few months," Eric said. He took a deep breath, then said, "And I think he's not only at the wedding Nell's attending today, but he could very well be using it as a cover for a 'business' transaction."

Callen could tell what Eric did not say, that knowing Nell as they did, if she saw anything suspicious, she would doubtless start snooping about. And not only was she not a seasoned field agent, she was only armed with Kensi's pepper spray as far as Callen knew.

"What evidence you got?" Sam asked.

The technical operator shifted uneasily on his feet. It was apparent that it was more a nervous hunch that had set him off than hard data, but Callen believed in going with one's gut and was willing to give Eric the benefit of the doubt. Plus, it wasn't just Eric's instincts that were on high alert. There was that tight knot of his own residing heavily in his stomach and the tension in his team mates that, albeit subtle by normal standards, was obvious to him.

"I know you guys had a hinky feeling about this wedding, too," Eric said, not looking at all certain of himself. Callen nodded once, slowly and encouragingly. So did the others.

_Get to the point, Eric._

"It's probably because we all give the inter-agency dailies at least a cursory perusal, and guess who was included in today's ATF alerts?"

"D'Arcangelis," Callen said.

"ATF sources stated that Marco's had a big deal in the works for several weeks. And that he was leaving town to attend a wedding," Eric said. "And guess whose mother is cousins with D'Arcangelis' mother?"

"The blushing bride?" Deeks asked.

"Bingo," Eric said.

"All that doesn't mean there's something going down there, though," Sam said. He crossed his arms and tried to look doubtful, playing devil's advocate to all of their instincts.

"True...' Eric trailed off. The tech chewed his lip in what looked like a contemplative manner, but Callen could tell the young man was biting back his nerves and frustration. It was almost as if Callen was psychic, it was so easy to pluck the thoughts from Eric's head.

_Why are they dragging their feet when Nell's in danger?!_

Kensi had been leaning against her desk, looking oddly distant as the rest of the team discussed the situation, or _if_ there even was a situation. Callen raised his eyebrows in question when their eyes met. Whatever she'd been contemplating, the female agent seemed to have come to a decision. She uncrossed her arms and straightened.

"Whether or not this D'Arcangelis is planning to seal some shady business deal at the wedding, Nell _is_ in trouble," Kensi said.

How was she so _damn_ certain? What did she know that the rest of them didn't? When did... _that phone call!_

"That was Nell earlier?" Callen asked. Kensi nodded.

"What?" Eric asked.

"Why didn't you say anything?" Callen felt the bite of anger edge his voice. He had been perfectly willing to allow Kensi her privacy. But this, _this _wasn't the female agent's personal business. _This_ was Nell. _Their_ Nell. All of _their_ concern.

"What?" Eric asked again, looking from Callen to Kensi and back to Callen as the two alpha personalities clashed in a silent war of wills. Callen refused to back down. Kensi _should_ have told them straight off. Why was she trying to stare him down like he'd insulted her, threatened her?

"What is it?" The despair in the tech's voice was very nearly childlike whining.

Finally, Kensi broke away from the odd staring contest they'd somehow fallen into, and Callen shook off the confrontation as she began to divulge the bizarre phone call she'd received not fifteen minutes earlier.

"Nell called me from a bathroom in the country club and asked me to come pick her up," Kensi said. "She was embarassed about her_... state _and made me promise not to tell anyone."

Callen nodded encouragingly. What Kensi had done, she had done out of loyalty and friendship. And Callen could respect that.

"She did mention something about mobsters," Kensi said.

Okay, something was definitely up and Nell appeared to have been caught in the middle of it.

"But..." Kensi continued, startling Callen from contemplating how best to extract Nell without embarrassing her in front of her friends. "She also mentioned bears with Chicago accents and thought someone might have drugged her champagne."

Callen frowned.

"Do you think there's any truth to her claims?" Callen asked, not meaning to sound doubtful, but wanting to gauge just how much he should be worrying about the petite intelligence analyst.

"I can see where she got the 'bear' idea from," Deeks said, indicating the ugly mug on the screen above their desks.

"Nell sounded messed up pretty bad," Kensi said. "And in my experience, she always keeps a firm control on what she drinks."

Callen nodded and finally made his decision to act.

"Alright, we need to get Nell out of there," he said. The tension seeped out of Deeks and Sam's postures. Kensi nodded her approval. And Eric sighed audibly. But what was the best way to go about this? "Options?"

"In my opinion, Nell never needs to know I broke her confidence," Kensi said. "She _did_ call me, so I'll just go and pick her up like she asked me."

"And if you stumble onto D'Arcangelis' dealings and he's not in a forgiving mood?" Deeks asked, obviously concerned for his partner.

"Then Callen and Sam will come in as my back up because they'll be waiting nearby," Kensi said.

It was sloppy. Who knew if they could get close enough to the country club while being inconspicuous to be of use in an emergency. Kensi could handle herself, no doubt. But how many men did D'Arcangelis have with him? And Could Kensi manage a possibly drugged, incoherent Nell _and _fend off several attackers?

Callen sighed. It was the best they had on short notice. Besides, there likely would be no trouble if Nell was hiding out in the ladies' room. He doubted even a black market arms dealer who'd never been caught was paranoid enough to carry out an illicit transaction in the women's bathroom. And they had no definitive proof that D'Arcangelis was even there for more than anything but enjoying a family event.

"Okay, let's get Nell."

"Not so fast, Mister Callen."

Hetty had remained silent all through their little team debate, but now she spoke up when they'd finally made a decision?! What was the old spy up to?

* * *

**A/N: What's Hetty got in mind? ;-)**


	8. Part 3, Chapter 3

**Author's Note: Sorry for the delay. Been busy/away.**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 3: The Call**

**Chapter 3: In which Nell's new boyfriend is revealed…**

"Do I need to remind you of the oath you have all taken, that Miss Jones has taken, to this country and its people..." Hetty looked each member of her team in the eyes. Callen knew they were remembering the day they were sworn in as NCIS agents, himself included. And then the physically diminutive (yet commanding) woman turned her attention to include the detective, who wasn't an agent and yet one of them nonetheless. "...to protect and serve..."

Hetty was right of course, those in law enforcement had all devoted themselves to the same cause, whether they were undercover NCIS agents, LAPD detectives... or genius intelligence analysts with big eyes, innocent smiles and pixie haircuts. The way the old spy had reminded them all of their sense of duty, rather than their sense of loyalty, did not sit well with Callen, however. And when she finally met his gaze again, he gave her a look that spoke volumes. Primarily, it said 'What the hell, Hetty?'

She looked away, addressing the team as a whole, rather than indulging Callen's accusing glare.

"D'Arcangelis is a serious threat to the safety of this country and its citizenry," she said. "Although it's never been proven, the man has been linked to over a dozen murders. Indirectly, he has been responsible for hundreds, probably thousands more deaths."

Finally, she met Callen's gaze with one more steely than he could ever conjure, and believe him, he sure had given it much cultivation over the years.

"Nell" -Hetty's usage of their analyst's first name did not go unnoticed- "would not want us to pass up the opportunity that has presented itself, to put a stop to the activities of a very bad man."

"What exactly do you have in mind, Hetty?" Callen asked when he'd finally fought down the protective streak that had seized most of his higher brain functions and all of his baser instincts. The point she made was valid, after all.

"Miss Jones has already established a legitimate cover," Hetty said.

"But it's not actually a cover," Deeks said. The concern was apparent in the protest.

"He's right, Hetty," Sam said. "Nell's totally exposed."

"And in no condition to be the primary agent in an op," Kensi said, reminding them of the probable drugging of their team mate, of the fact that she was hiding out in the bathroom, confused and frightened.

"But she provides the means to send one of you in without arousing any suspicion." Callen was pretty certain whom Hetty had in mind when she met his gaze once more.

"What's the play?" Kensi asked, following Hetty's lead and looking to Callen as well. Sometimes he longed to be more imaginative with covers, but there was a reason clichés were perpetuated. People bought stereotypes and the easiest, most obvious cover often was accepted without an iota of doubt. Callen looked to Sam to confirm. His partner was the best sounding board, and the most honest one to run ideas by.

"Repentant boyfriend?"

Sam nodded. "To blend in at this wedding, he'd better be rich, too."

"Nouveau riche," Callen said.

"There's no time to backstop Old Money," Sam agreed.

"It sounds as if you have a plan, Mr. Callen," Hetty said. It was her way of turning control of the operation back over to the senior agent, with her approval now that she'd coaxed it into the direction she wished. He nodded gratefully, feeling more at ease now that he was in very familiar territory.

"Right," Callen nodded, turned to the tech geek who looked as if he were practically begging to be assigned something to do, some way to help his friend and partner. "Eric, I want you to go through the guest list, see if you can't figure out who D'Arcangelis might be meeting at the wedding."

Eric nodded, and looked as if he were about to bolt and carry out Callen's orders immediately.

"But first, you need to create some basic credentials for Nell's new boyfriend."

Eric raised his eyebrows, looking curious.

"And who precisely will that be?" he asked.

"Oh!" Deeks bounced up, not unlike a child eager to be called upon to deliver a note to the principal's office because he really wanted to get out of class. Actually, Callen was certain it was precisely like that.

"I volunteer to hobnob it," he said. "Although, it will likely hurt me socially to be seen in such circles..."

Kensi rolled her eyes. "Yes, because the filthy rich are so far beneath you."

"Precisely," Deeks said.

"Looking like that..." Sam indicated the blonde mane rakishly haloing the detective's head. "Even vagrants would throw you out from under the overpass for lowering the amount of class around the barrel fire."

Deeks played dense, putting on a bewildered face. "Are you trying to tell me something, Sam?"

"Yeah. Shave and get a haircut."

"Now, gentlemen..." Hetty interrupted with her amused but not amused voice, holding up a hand to silence them. "Mr. Deeks, I am sure were Miss Jones here, she would express her appreciation for your enthusiasm to come to her aide."

_Or to get out of filling out forms_, Callen thought. Okay that was perhaps unfair. The detective cared about Nell Jones as much as the rest of them, for he was part of their team, their odd little family.

Deeks beamed. And then he must have realized he'd been shut down with Hetty's compliment, because his face fell. The detective didn't have to ask the question obviously forming on his lips and Hetty didn't have to answer.

"I'll be going under," Callen said. There hadn't been any question in his mind. As soon as he learned that rather than extracting Nell as quickly as possible, they were leaving her in play, he knew it would be he who would go in. Callen never had a family, and even friends were rare; in particular those who actually knew him, not just one of his aliases. And his team were inarguably the closest thing he'd ever had to a family. And one of those people, one of the more vulnerable of them, were in trouble. He wouldn't be able to stand by and let someone else take the lead.

Callen was going to fetch Nell. (And it admittedly crossed his mind that he was going to lock the young woman in the ops room and never let her out again.)

"Hey!" Deeks said upon Callen's reappearance. "Why doesn't Callen have to shave?"

Callen scrubbed a hand over his perpetual five o'clock shadow. He long ago decided it wasn't worth the effort of trying to stave off the stubble altogether. A brief doubt as to whether it was a hindrance to the believability of his cover flashed in his mind, but Kensi put an abrupt end to the concern.

"Because Callen can pull off ruggedly wealthy," the female agent said as she studied the senior agent's appearance. Callen had thought he looked the part in the expensive Italian suit (sans tie with the top couple shirt buttons left undone) and he trusted Hetty's judgment, but it was reassuring to have a woman whose standards for suave hadn't been set in the middle of the previous century. Although Hetty would justly argue that there was a better breed of class and style then.

"I can pull off 'ruggedly wealthy.'" Deeks sulked. "Whatever _that_ means."

"It means that G makes that suit look good," Sam said. "It doesn't wear him. He wears it."

"Thank you, Sam," Callen said. "I never knew you felt that way."

Sam glared at him, but in his facetious rather than menacing way. Callen grinned back at him as he began sorting through the credentials Eric had whipped up for his alias and checking the kit he was bringing along. The standard driver's license, credit cards, business cards... All seemed in good order. They'd opted to incorporate his real name into the alias. Nell, like most of the team, tended to address him as 'Callen.' And given her compromised state and whether they could even get a hold of her once more to warn her about the little op they'd thrown together, her usage of his name was a likelihood. Thus, Nell's new boyfriend was one 'Callen Morris.'

Frankly, Agent Callen was more concerned with the weapon he'd pulled from his desk drawer. He'd become quite comfortable with his SIG Sauer P229 . It had proven itself a reliable friend and he wouldn't leave it behind today. Okay, so there was no point in anthropomorphizing a firearm, but there was nothing wrong with appreciating a reliable tool. He had just cleaned it yesterday and hadn't fired it since, but... There was no time for the anxious habit of stripping down the pistol and putting it back together, even though the knot in his stomach could use the cathartic effect the procedure always lent him.

Callen heard Deeks begin to protest again. Sam thankfully cut him off.

"You, however," the big ex-Seal told the detective, "Would just look like a hobo in an expensive suit."

Kensi laughed in a stifled manner that probably didn't spare her partner's feelings in the least. Callen shook his head, chuckling as he pocketed Mr. Morris' wallet, and fastened the expensive Swiss watch about his wrist. 'Pick on Deeks' had become a beloved passtime of the team apparently. And he knew that deep down, the detective wasn't really hurt by their teasing. They all knew it helped them diffuse any anxieties that arose from the tense cases they undertook.

Hetty reappeared with Eric in tow. The younger agent did not look happy. Which probably meant he hadn't been able to glean any useful Intel. Callen didn't especially like going in blind, but he couldn't blame Eric. The tech was good, but even he couldn't complete such a task in under twenty minutes, especially when the other half of his brain was holed up in the ladies' room of a country club hotel at a fancy wedding, potentially under the influence of some nasty chemicals.

"Are you ready, Mr. Callen?" Hetty asked.

"Don't worry, Hetty," Callen said. They all knew Nell was more than just an intelligence analyst to the older woman. Hetty was grooming her for something special, possibly for the unthinkable event of replacing her irreplaceable self when she finally left the service. "I'll bring Nell back safe and sound."

Hetty sighed before she spoke.

"I am compelled by Director Vance to remind you that your primary objective in this operation is to verify whether D'Arcangelis is conducting one of his less-than-legal business transactions at the Worthington-Applegate wedding. And if that is indeed the case, to gather evidence and make an arrest to that end."

So there was another reason why Eric looked upset. Securing Nell was only secondary in the director's opinion, which was not the case for any of those present. They all knew their duty, their responsibility to protect civilians, and would do all they could to catch D'Arcangelis, but not at the price of one of their own. Nell was not a sacrifice Callen was willing to make just so Director Vance could bolster his record and status in Homeland's eyes. And if he thought the young woman was in any real danger, he'd pull her out immediately and to hell with Vance. If the director didn't realize Nell was a much more valuable asset than D'Arcangelis was a take-down, then he shouldn't be the director of a major US agency,

"I understand," Callen said coldly, checking a magazine before loading it into his SIG with a deft play of his hands.

* * *

**A/N: Soon our players will collide… ;-)**


	9. Part 3, Chapter 4

**Author's Note: This part is really rather pointless… But a little of f***ed Nell just to break up the bulk of this fic apparently being Callen-centric (apparently, I can't help myself, because there is more coming up next).**

* * *

**Exposed  
**

**Part 3: The Call  
**

**Chapter 4: In which Nell comes to terms with a chaotic universe...  
**

Alcohol in conjunction with its more dubious cohorts was clearly the recipe for Antimatter. Just when you thought you'd gotten the universe in order, some gets thrown into the mix and everything is chaos once more. Chaos.

Nell Jones could not abide chaos.

Thus, Nell Jones had never been much of one for drinking. It wasn't a conscious choice. Okay, it in part was. She _liked_ control. She liked_ being _in control. She _needed _to be in control.

She was _not _in control.

And because she could not assert control over herself or the fricken chaotic universe, she did the only logical next step. She limited the universe, so that the chaos would not be significant enough to sweep her away. The Ladies' Room had a deadbolt. But someone must have a key to that, and that fact was unsettling. But at least the door opened in. So Nell dragged (pushed and shoved) the fancy, floral upholstered sofa over to block the door. The task took an eternity since it stubbornly refused to move, like a great rosebud covered rhinoceros. The universe, despite having contracted a great deal, began spinning uncontrollably once more, so Nell flopped down on Rosie the Rhinoceros' back and waited. (Rosie was quite soft for a rhinoceros.)

Because she had also sent out a distress call to the next universe over, her home universe, the plane in which she normally existed, Nell allowed herself to snuggle down into Rosie's cloud-like embrace. Rhinoceros sofas were just _the best_. The only thing better would be the nice, tight embrace of a pair of strong arms.

_Where's Jack?_

Not here. Thank God.

_But his eyes are so green. And he smells so good. And his smile…_

But he is so definitely chaos.

Then the universe was shattering, vibrating at such a high frequency Nell's brain was turning to mush. Apparently her grey matter had some sort of resistance, however, for enough did not liquefy as to be able to identify the source of the destructive shrilling.

Her phone.

After failing to recover the device from her clutch, Nell opted to dump the small purse's entire contents onto Rosie's back. She reached out and plucked up the communicator -whispering "Kirk to Enterprise" with a small giggle- with little difficulty, but focusing on the screen and selecting to answer Kensi Blye's call was far more challenging. In fact, it was rather surprising it did not forward to voicemail before she managed the task.

"Hello?"

_Nell, are you all right?_

Well, if she was honest, the answer to that was 'No.'

_Are you hurt? Sick?_

Oops, Nell had spoken her thoughts out loud again. She seemed to be doing that an awful lot.

_So, you're okay? _Kensi sounded dubious.

"I'm fine," Nell said aloud on purpose this time. "The universe could use a little more order, though."

There was a beat of silence before Kensi spoke again.

_Nell, I'm not coming to get you._

Oh. She was so screwed!

_You're not screwed. I promise._

Damn your stupid mouth, Nell Jones!

_Callen's going to find you and make sure you're all right._

"What?!" Callen? Agent Callen? Senior Agent Callen? Special Agent In Charge Callen? The man who had taken over half a year to warm up to her, let alone accept her, respect her, include her fully in his team? How embarrassing for him to have to come to her rescue, to find her in this helpless, ridiculous state!

_Nell? Nell, are you there?_

"Yes. Sorry, Kensi."

Why did she tell Callen?! It wasn't as if Nell had made the female agent pinky swear. It wasn't as if they exchanged friendship bracelets they'd made for each other while giggling over lunch. But her betrayal hurt nonetheless.

_Eric figured out that there's an arms dealer attending your friend's wedding. Hetty and Director Vance found out. And... well, Callen will explain when he gets to you._

What?!

_Are you still in the Ladies' Room?_

Nell nodded her head, the world began to spin and then she realized Kensi could not in fact see her.

"Yes," she said.

_I'm looking at a schematic of the hotel. Which floor are you on?_

It had been a ridiculously arduous journey to her micro-universe, but Nell was pretty certain that it had not involved stairs. In fact, if it _had_ involved stairs, she would probably be lying in a stairwell with her head split open from falling down them.

"The ground floor, I think." Crap, were her words becoming slurred again?

_West side, North Side or East Side?_

"I-I don't know?" Just stop interrogating her, for god's sake, woman! Kensi couldn't keep a secret and now she was badgering Nell's poor, beleaguered brain.

_Okay, Nell. That's all right. We'll find you._

The concern and sincerity in Kensi Blye's reassuring voice made Nell feel guilty. She loved her. She was just the most awesomest friend.

_Thanks. I think you're the most awesomest friend, too, Nell. Can you do something super awesome for me?_

"Anything." Kensi was so cool and she thought Nell was cool, too. Nell didn't have many friends, and none of them were as cool as Kensi Blye. Kensi Blye was just the-

_Can you sit tight? Just stay exactly where you are until Callen gets there?_

"Yes."

_Will you be okay?_

"Rosie's keeping the door for me."

_Umm... good. That's good, Nell. I'll talk to you soon, okay?_

"Okay."

Why did Kensi sound so worried?! Everything was dandy. Besides the world spinning around in an unnatural way. It was a little bit fun like a Merry-go-round, though. Maybe sometimes it was good to lose control, to give into chaos.

Because Nell was flying around the little universe on a floral rhinoceros.

* * *

**A/N: Up Next… collision time… Will Nell's universe survive or collapse? How will Callen react to finding Nell in such a chaotic state?**


	10. Part 4, Chapter 1

**Author's Note: I was trying to break this fic up more, into smaller chapters so that it would be easier to update regularly, but alas, this bit seemed not to want to end. Finally hit a stopping point. **

**Warning: Vague allusions to mature subject matter, but nothing remotely graphic. (And out of character-ness?)**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 4: The Collision**

**Chapter 1: In which Callen finds an intoxicated Nell to be frustrating, amusing, mortifyingly verbose and in general, a handful…**

"I'm not having sex with you. Go away!"

Callen's fist hesitated mid-knock. That was definitely Nell Jones' voice; a little more aggressive and aggravated than he was accustomed to hearing, but Nell nonetheless.

Upon locating the restroom, he had tried the door with the intention of simply doing a quick check for the petite red-head, only to find it securely locked. _Good girl_, he had thought, knowing Kensi and Eric had determined the specific ladies room that held Nell despite the analyst's incoherency over the phone (which Callen had found rather disturbing). The young woman had wisely taken measures to ensure her own safety. And so he had knocked.

Now he paused and listened intently at the door. Maybe it hadn't been Nell who had locked the world out. Maybe it had been someone else who had locked her _in_. In Kensi's more comprehensive relation, word-for-word, of Nell's initial phone call, there had been mention of an ex-boyfriend whom Nell herself had suspected as the poisoner. And a few of the people he had talked to before making his way into the hotel and (hopefully) to Nell's aide had mentioned seeing her with a man. It hadn't been necessary to stop for quick chats with various guests and hotel employees since Eric had called up the schematics and they'd determined there were at most three locations where Nell could be holed up. But it never hurt to solidify a cover, especially prior to any _incidents _arising.

And so Nell Jones' guilty and slightly anxious boyfriend had asked around, trying desperately to find and make amends to her for deciding to attend a business meeting rather than accompany her to her friend's wedding . The fool had obviously realized his grave mistake at upsetting his pretty, young girlfriend and excused himself from the meeting rushing to the country club to try some groveling. _Maybe not groveling. _Callen Morris did not seem the type to grovel, building up a fortune from nothing took a rather significant amount of assertiveness. Agent Callen could do _assertive_, but given Nell's condition, perhaps 'assertive alpha male' was uncalled for... Then again, if she wasn't alone in there...

Callen listened more intently, but heard no other voices or sound whatsoever. He knocked again.

"I said 'go away.' Just because you're so damn-" Here there was an audible sigh. "-_delicious_ looking. And it's obvious I haven't been laid in a _long_ time, doesn't mean I'm going to sleep with you, Jack."

_Jack. _Jack Worthington. A woman with ridiculously white teeth, a large brimmed sunhat and epic sunglasses had identified the man Nell had been having champagne with as young Mr. Worthington, the bride's brother. So the asshole had been pestering Nell, and when he hadn't gotten his way...

"Nell, it's Callen," he said. "Please let me in. I'm here to help."

"Who?"

Had he mistakenly gotten the wrong woman hiding out in the ladies' room? The likelihood of even two women locking themselves in restrooms to hide from ex-boyfriends named 'Jack' was minimal at best. So he tried again.

"Callen. You called, remember?" He didn't mention Kensi's name in the off-chance someone could overhear them. So far, this little drama was in keeping with their flimsy cover.

"How do I know it's you?"

"Did you tell someone here about me? Would anyone at the wedding even know my name?"

He was relieved to hear movement. The back and forth through a bathroom door was beyond irritating. He tensed slightly, involuntarily as a much louder sound than the simple 'click' of the lock issued forth from beyond the door. He relaxed as his brain couldn't find anything sinister in the noise. It sounded almost as if the analyst were moving furniture around. Then the lock clicked, and the door cracked open, revealing one bright and slightly reddened hazel eye.

The door opened wider and then stopped abruptly, leaving about a foot of space for Callen to squeeze through. Upon entering the ladies' bathroom (which he noted was what he assumed all ladies' rooms were- nicer than the men's), Callen realized what prevented the door from opening completely was a rather creatively (if one were being generous) upholstered couch. So Nell had barricaded the door. Maybe 'street smarts' weren't entirely a loss on the young woman, like they pretty much were on her oft oblivious partner. Don't get him wrong, Callen rather liked the pair of techies. They were excellent at they did; intelligent, trustworthy, and easy to get along with. They just weren't field agents, and Callen did not expect them to behave as such. Oh, he knew Nell had training, could handle a weapon and herself to a degree. But he didn't think it came naturally to her.

The forethought to secure herself was even more impressive considering the fact that she was barely standing. Her whole body swayed from side to side and she seemed to be looking through him rather than at him.

"Nell?" After closing and locking the door once more, Callen approached the young woman slowly, like she were a skittish rare animal, and surveyed her just as closely as if he were the zoologist making the discovery. The brilliant mind he knew she possessed was _definitely_ residing elsewhere. And her body _definitely_ seemed to be attempting to follow.

He placed his hands on her arms to steady her, thought about seating her on the couch before her legs decided to stop working, and instead settled on guiding her into the better lighting near the sinks. He wanted to do a more thorough check than 'yup, she's intoxicated.' So he lifted her up by the waist, felt a brief shock at the unexpected skin on skin contact (he'd forgotten about that damn dress' lack of a back), and set her down on the gray marble countertop between two sinks.

Before he did anything else, there was one responsibility Callen had to see to first. He had to let the others know he'd found Nell in one piece. Well, one piece _physically_, anyway. He still wasn't sure in what reality her mind was residing at the moment.

Sam was the only one remotely on site, sitting outside of the main drive of the country club, the _mile_ long drive. Eric, Kensi and Deeks were combing through the guest list, trying to glean any leads. So they weren't running with comms up. They might need to later, but for now... Callen pulled out Mr. Morris' cell phone when he was certain that Nell wasn't going to fall over and crack her head on the sink without his support. She was looking better now that she was sitting still. Moving the overstuffed love seat around had doubtless made her inebriated head spin.

Callen called his partner first, informed him that he'd found Nell and inquired whether the big ex-seal had seen anything of interest. Sam reported that unless you thought trees growing and birds singing were suspicious, there was nothing of interest to note. Sam made Callen promise to keep him apprised of how Nell was doing and then they ended the call.

Now for the more difficult...

Eric picked up.

_Did you find her? Is she okay? What happened? Tell me she's okay!_

Callen fought the urge to chuckle as he replied. Eric's distress was endearing. Not that Callen did sappy or emotional.

"I'm with Nell right now. She's not hurt."

Saying she was fine would be an outright lie. But with all of that exposed skin, there was no way Callen would've missed any physical injury to the young woman.

"Is Hetty there?"

_Here, Mr. Callen._

So he was on speaker phone... No surprise there. Actually, that was a good idea. Nell seemed to be coming around and she might as well brief all of them at once. He switched the cell to speaker and set it on the counter top beside Nell.

Placing a finger under her chin, he gently lifted the intoxicated young woman's flushed face, forcing her to look at him.

"Nell?" Her pupils were dilated wide despite the bright vanity lights that were obviously meant to aide women in 'powdering their noses' more than for making sure hands were washed clean of any signs of dirt. The flush on her cheeks might have been from embarrassment, if she had been sober.

"You have beautiful blue eyeshh." She slurred heavily on the last word. The smile twitched the corner of Callen's mouth despite his attempt to remain serious. Nell Jones was a little bit cute this way. And that was wrong because someone had intended to make her vulnerable and pliable, amenable to things she wouldn't otherwise be.

"...like the Caribbean ocean. You could jus-jusht swim..."

The inebriated pixie redhead continued to describe his eyes in a flattering way that was fast becoming more uncomfortable than amusing. Nell was a very blunt, straightforward person, but even drunk, Callen couldn't imagine her saying anything like this. There was definitely something stronger in her system. He decided to interrupt before she started improvising poetry. The others might forgive her drunken rambling, but they could only hold back on son much material for teasing. Especially Deeks and Kensi, who were doubtless gathered with Eric and Hetty at the other end of the open line.

"Nell," Callen said. She thankfully stopped comparing his blue eyes to 'a clear sky that could turn stormy at a moment's notice.' "Can you tell me what happened to you?"

The mop of auburn locks bobbed up and down in the affirmative. He waited for several moments until the realization dawned that she wasn't going to proceed in telling her tale. Apparently, her wandering (or floating away on a tide of alcohol and other intoxicants as it were) mind required more direct instruction.

"Well, tell me," he said, looking directly into her wide, bright, unfocused eyes. She blinked several times in rapid succession.

"Tell you what?" Nell asked, nonplussed.

He stifled a growl of frustration. _Patience, Agent Callen._

"Tell me what happened to you. Start at the beginning."

Those big, round hazel eyes blinked slowly, blankly. Had she understood? Nell wasn't dumb. Even inebriated she had managed to identify that she'd been compromised, located a relatively safe place to hide and called for help. There was something else going on with her. Those flushed cheeks were perhaps in fact covering a blush. She'd reached out to Kensi but had withdrawn from him, remaining firstly quiet and then directing conversation elsewhere. The rambling about his 'blue eyes' was undeniably due to her altered state, but its subconscious intent had obviously been to deflect attention from her situation. She was embarrassed, more so because he was the one who had appeared to help her. He couldn't blame her. Being viewed as weak by someone who was neither a stranger, nor a friend, but whom you had to face every day nonetheless... How could he ease the young analyst's mind?

They didn't have time for him to take her through a touchy-feely, team bonding, therapy moment. What she needed was to get out of this predicament. And for that to happen they had to complete several other tasks first, such as...

"Nell, you arrived at the country club around 2pm? Who was the first person you saw?"

She chewed her lip in the way a very small, very adorable child contemplated the answer to an adult asking them how old they are.

"The parking attendant, I think..."

Callen was relieved when Nell began to take them all through her day. He had hoped the specificity of his question would focus her mind. And if she used whatever brain cells that weren't partying it up in a flood of chemical-induced euphoric oblivion to concentrate on remembering, then maybe she would no longer be able to be freaked out by the awkward position they found themselves in… Made more awkward as his hands began to explore her body, ghosting over bare skin and soft fabric, checking her for any injury he may have missed. Her skin was hot to the touch. Not feverish, but bordering on it. And the flush on her normally pale skin seemed to be persisting. Alcohol could take some people that way, so probably not conclusive evidence of poisoning.

Nell was becoming more animated as she described the wedding ceremony, which was obviously still a pleasant memory for her. Good. In their line of work, there was few good days. He was glad that whatever more sinister happenings were going on hadn't entirely ruined the event for her.

Not so good was the fact that her gestures as she described the gazebo and layout of the grounds were more exaggerated than usual. When he held a finger up before her eyes to test whether she could track the movement, Nell went comically cross-eyed, which made Callen smile despite everything. She only put up with the exercise for a second before becoming frustrated, or maybe dizzy. She swatted at his offending finger, failing to grab it as she'd obviously been intending to do. Unfortunately, she'd also fallen silent with the mental capacity he'd just forced her to use. He urged her to resume her story.

"What did you do after the ceremony?"

Nell began chattering, faltering for a moment when he pressed two fingers to her neck to check her pulse. He had no reference point for the young woman, but given her basically perky, energetic nature, Callen was fairly certain her heart rate was on the slow side of what was normal for her. Not dangerously slow, however. And she seemed to be breathing fine, when she actually took breaths between the run on sentences. Now that she'd started talking, she seemed incapable of stopping.

Jack Worthington was indeed the ex-boyfriend with whom Nell had drunk champagne, whom had _brought_ her the glasses of ridiculously expensive wine with bubbles in it (laced with who knew what?!), and whom was now on Callen's agenda for the day.

"...he only did it because I never had sex with him back in high school. Actually I broke up..."

Callen picked up the phone from where he had set it on the counter, so that he could be heard over Nell's rambling tale. It had taken so much effort to get her started, he didn't want to risk interrupting her and inadvertently pushing her back into embarrassed silence. There could be something useful in all of the random, circuitous paths her narrative was taking, after all.

"Hetty, did you get all that?" he asked.

_Yes, Agent Callen. Mr. Beale is already working up a background on younger Mr. Worthington._

Nell was continuing to talk with no sign of stopping, either not caring or not noticing the loss of her audience's undivided attention.

"...graduate a virgin. Like that would be any incentive to sleep with him. Not 'I love you.' Or 'you mean the world to me.' But 'hey, you don't want to be one of those loser girls who graduates a virgin'...'

Yup, self-consciousness had definitely vacated the young woman's thoughts as she became consumed by her rant. Women could really hold a grudge against their exes. Callen made a note to be more gentle when breaking it off with a lover.

"Where are we at with the guest list?" Callen asked of Hetty.

There were some voices on the other end of the line. He couldn't quite discern the specific words, but it was evident Hetty was getting a report from the team.

_Mr. Beale informs me that with the assistance of Ms. Blye and Mr. Deeks, he's cleared 73 of the 257 guests._

How good a job could they be doing if they hadn't found any dirt on nearly a third of the cutthroat businessmen and aristocrats?

Hetty seemed to be reading his thoughts.

_Well, they do tell me they've flagged a few individuals on behalf of the IRS and SEC but have found no one of particular interest to us thus far._

Callen considered reporting he was likewise empty-handed, but that would imply he had done any investigating besides tracking down Nell. Which he had not. Besides, he wasn't empty-handed. He had his hands quite full with Nell herself. The young woman was gesticulating so ardently as she rambled on, that he had to move a hand back to her arm to keep her from falling sidewise. Again, even from 50 miles away, the old spy seemed capable to pluck the thoughts straight from the lead agent's head.

_How is Miss Jones?_

Hetty's tone was as even as ever, but he knew the older woman well enough to detect the concern belying her unflappable exterior.

"I believe her when she says she had only a couple of glasses of champagne. But she's far more intoxicated than she should be... Even for someone of Nell's… uh…" Always tread lightly when describing a tiny person to an even tinier, extremely deadly one. "…petite stature."

_Does she require further medical attention than you can provide, Mr. Callen?_

Survival training for a field agent of his particular skill set didn't always include any medical aspect, but after having to swathe his own stomach in duct tape to prevent his guts from spilling out of an extremely nasty machete wound that one time, the seasoned undercover operative had decided some actual official field medic training might be beneficial. It was probably the best decision he'd ever made. And it currently gave him enough knowledge to recognize that the wasted junior agent in front of him was in no real danger at the moment. At least medically speaking. However, the words currently coming out of her mouth...

It was an undeniable fact that over 90% of all audio garnered on a stakeout was irrelevant. When either survielling in person or reviewing after the fact, such chatter had a tendency towards the mind-numbing. A vital skill to survive stakeouts thus was the ability to simultaneously tune inane prattle out and analyze it for anything of interest. Oddly, it was also a skill that seemed to be developed by college students everywhere. But however acquired, it was a skill Callen not only possessed but frequently used, and had been employing with the rambling, intoxicated young woman. There had been no mention of mafia men or shady dealings, but the topic of her monologue had taken such an unexpected turn that he simply stared at her in open-mouth shock.

In her entirely inhibition-free state, Nell had slipped from the topic of her high school boyfriend to retelling the circumstances in which she lost her virginity. Not an entirely random progression, for certain. But even drunk, Nell would never share such personal information. Callen had almost recovered enough to interrupt the young woman and get her to stop sharing such intimate details, but the story was as short as, apparently, the experience had been. When she immediately segued into discussing the merits of various sexual positions, the normally unfazeable (at least he'd like to think so) agent was shocked into inaction anew. Didn't they always say it was the ones you least expected that turned out to be nymphomaniacs?

Okay, that was unfair. Nell had been given inhibition-killing drugs and he himself had encouraged her to talk. And...

"Is that even possible?" he asked, completely forgetting himself.

With an immodest smile the likes of which he'd never seen her adorn before, Nell nodded her head vigorously, swayed a bit from the motion and then continued on her vivid verbal illustration. Callen couldn't help but contemplate the mental picture briefly before he came to his senses. He definitely needed to get her to shut up! Immediately!

Employing the oldest trick in the book for instantly silencing a person, he put a finger to her lips as if she were a small child who couldn't quite understand the social cues indicating that they needed to be quiet. Nell, thankfully, fell silent, once again going cross-eyed as she contemplated one of his fingers being shoved in her face.

Her lips were soft and warm.

Callen shook his head to rid himself of all the personal information that was just far beyond anything he ever wanted to know about the young woman.

A loud, meaningful throat clearing issued from the cell phone sitting forgotten in his hand. He switched it off from speaker. Much too late, he feared. Hopefully, Nell would remember none of this. He brought the phone to his ear in time to catch Hetty reiterating her previous inquiry as to the degree of medical attention Miss Jones required.

"She should be fine, Hetty. Just needs to sleep it off, I think."

_Good to hear, Mr. Callen. Then we shall proceed with the operation._

"How exactly are we supposed to do that?"

* * *

**A/N: Hope it was worth the wait…And oh, there are more "interesting" (hint hint, nudge nudge) things to come…**


	11. Part 4, Chapter 2

**Author's Note: I don't think I always say it, but I **_**am**_** always appreciative of the reviews and feedback! I promise to get back to Nell soon. This was meant to be about her after all… I just seem very reluctant to get out of Callen's head.**

**Warning: References to mature subject matter…?**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 4: The Collision**

**Chapter 2: In which Callen feels protective of, and then startled by contemplations of, Nell… **

"Nell is in no condition to _mingle_." Callen tried to bite back the sarcasm and frustration, but knew he was unsuccessful. "And I'm not leaving her alone in a public restroom." He didn't have to add, _where anyone at all could stumble upon her seemingly drunken person. _It was more than implied in his tone.

_I'm not asking you to do any such thing, _Hetty said. The curt edge to her voice indicated that he had insulted her somewhat with the implication that she'd abandon the young woman, or have him do so, as it were.

"Well, what do you suggest, then?" Callen asked, knowing that if the operation were to succeed they couldn't remove Nell Jones from the situation. She provided their entire cover, their only reason for being there, the means to interact with and investigate the guests. But neither was she in any condition to commence covert intelligence gathering.

_You said Miss Jones simply needs to 'sleep it off', did you not?_

Now Hetty was using her 'I'm guiding a particularly slow child to an obvious conclusion' voice. It was somehow not condescending on the older woman as it would be on just about anyone else. But it frustrated Callen nonetheless. And he refused to indulge in an intellectual pursuit that was nothing more than a guessing game at the moment. Callen said nothing.

_Might I point out where you are, Mr. Callen?_

The women's restroom? The point was that they _couldn't_ leave Nell lying there intoxicated out of her mind to be found by a random stranger. Callen did not know this particular set all that well, but he still didn't trust any of the hundred or so men in the hotel... the _hotel_. Sometimes, he could be such an idiot! He winced at his own stupidity.

"Right. I think Mr. Morris will be getting a room to make his poor girlfriend more comfortable."

Eric's voice emerged from the small phone in a tinny echo. _Uh... The Worthington family rented out the entire hotel for three days._

So much for that idea. Honestly, Callen was a little relieved that they finally had an excuse to pull the compromised agent and abort the mission.

_Does Miss Jones have one of those rooms? _Hetty asked of the technical operator, dispelling the senior agent's temporary relief.

_It looks like she's already checked in_, Eric said over the clicking of computer keys.

Callen frowned. Checking into the hotel hadn't been included in Nell's little meandering narrative of the day's events. What else had she left out? Not that he could be angry with her in the least. He'd have to ask her to take him through events again once she sobered up a bit.

"All right," Callen said to those residing in the operations center. "I'll let you know when I get our little party girl settled in."

Terminating the call, he turned to said 'party girl', taking her gently by the arms.

"Nell?"

She squeezed her eyes tightly shut and then opened them wide in a cartoonish manner. Finally, they focused on Callen and he felt like maybe someone was finally home. Well, at least on their way home from a short trip because there was a light left burning.

"You have a room in this hotel?"

She confirmed that she indeed had a room at the hotel and wasn't it nice of Trish's family to make sure everyone had a place to stay but they were always the generous sort not like some of the wealthy old families one encounters, what? Yes, she had a key card somewhere. Where? In her purse, probably. And where was her purse?

"Rosie has it."

"I'm sorry, Nell," Callen said. "I don't understand."

She swallowed and blinked rapidly at him again, opened her mouth to speak and then closed it. Thankfully instead of sputtering more incoherence, she extended a bare, alabaster arm and pointed a slender finger towards the sofa lying askance before the door. Callen found the small white clutch agape, spewing its contents out onto the rosette-adorned cushion. He searched through the myriad of women's 'essentials' but there was nothing remotely resembling a hotel key card.

"Are you sure?" he asked, throwing a glance back at the young woman perched on he grey marble countertop. She was still sitting upright, so that was a good sign.

"Yes?" Nell said with no certainty at all in her slurred voice. Callen sighed, and began to feel around the sofa to see if the missing key had fallen between the cushions. As his fingers ran across grit and -oh god- something sticky, Callen found himself, as he sometimes (okay frequently) did, ranking the current ordeal amongst all the rest on the scale of traumatizing operations. He had a feeling before the day was out, this particular one would place quite high on the 'missions I wish I could forget' scale.

It was likely just in his head, but when he felt something _squirm_ across his fingertips, Callen yanked his hand away and decided upon plan B. Scooping everything back into the small white purse and snapping it shut, the fast-becoming-disgruntled agent returned to his unwitting charge.

Nell Jones turned large, hazel eyes upon his face and grinned broadly in an absent, ingenuous way that caused all of his crankiness to melt away. Nell was a good person, one of the best he'd ever met, and she was in trouble. It was not only his responsibility to keep a member of his team safe, but Callen _wanted_ to protect the young woman. And when he spoke to her, he couldn't help but note how softened his tone had become.

"Would you like to lay down? Rest your eyes for a little while?"

Nell nodded, listing forward as if the suggestion conjured the exhaustion lurking within her. Callen quickly stepped in close, catching her as she fell forward. Stifled words emanated from somewhere at chest level, where she had buried her face in his shirt. It sounded as if she had said 'You smell nice'. At least, that's what he hoped she'd said.

"Okay. Here we go."

The warning was probably unnecessary given her half-oblivious state. Tucking Nell's small purse under his arm and crouching down in front of her, Callen encircled her legs with his arms and hoisted her over his shoulder into a fireman's carry. Probably not the best way to travel for the intoxicated woman, with all the blood rushing to her abused head, but there wasn't much choice. Callen would've gladly scooped her gently into his arms and cradled her against his chest. But at least one hand had to be completely free to open doors, and more importantly, access the P229 nestled at the small of his back. Not the most convenient, or safest placement of a sidearm for certain, but really the only option available to undercover agents. A hip holster or underarm rig was obvious. An ankle holster was much too slow to access in most situations. And that left tucking it into the back of one's pants. Perhaps other locations had been tried, but Callen would stick with what was tried and true rather than risk shooting off certain _parts_ or not being able to draw his weapon fast enough to save his life (or Nell's, in this case).

Nell giggled as they made their way to the lobby, which was actually a good thing for solidifying their cover, he supposed. The young man he had talked to earlier was still manning the reception desk, and gave the pair an amused look. He had been quite helpful earlier, identifying Nell and pointing Callen in the right direction. The NCIS agent could only hope that the hotel clerk would be equally helpful now.

"My girlfriend lost her room key," Callen explained when the young man -Johnny, his name tag read- asked how he could help them.

"I see you found her, though," Johnny said, smiling broadly as the drunk girl waved at the clerk from behind Callen's back. "I'll see if I can get you another. Name?"

"Should be under 'Nell Jones.'"

Johnny could have given them a hard time, but the genial young man did not. Callen had a feeling the cuteness draped over the agent's shoulder had a lot to do with it. He thanked Johnny when he handed Callen a new key and told him the room number, having believed the agent's previously delivered cover story about arriving late to the wedding, as well as astutely deducing that Nell wasn't likely to recall any such information at the moment.

Whether it was necessary or not, Callen proceeded to carry Nell all the way to the second floor room she'd been assigned. No one would take note of a man carrying his obviously drunk girlfriend to their room, after all. And he was deriving more than just a little amusement from the way she alternately protested, squirmed and giggled as they traversed the ornately decorated halls of the hotel.

The room was a single, and its layout was halfway between 'quaint bed and breakfast' and 'high-end hotel.' The furnishings were cozy yet tastefully coordinated, rather than the austere approach chain hotels took. The bedspread matched the upholstered set of chairs that were arranged by a small table set in the corner. And the upholstery of the chairs matched the drapes that appeared to conceal French doors leading out onto a small deck. The theme was vines interspersed with little blooming lavender flowers, making the room look like 'idyllic' gone mad. A quick glance into the attached bath somehow eased his mind, for the motif did not progress into the simple but completely outfitted en suite.

Shifting Nell's practically nonexistent bulk slightly, Callen leaned over the full-sized bed to deposit her on the vine covered duvet. Instead of simply allowing herself to be swept away with the flow, Nell wrapped her arms around the senior agent's neck, causing him to be pulled down onto the bed along with her from the momentum. Nell giggled as their combined weight caused the mattress to bounce beneath them. Very much aware of the petite body underneath his, Callen levered himself up off from the intoxicated, laughing young woman, only to find himself ensnared by the arms still locked about his neck. Gently, he unclasped her hands and placed them on her stomach, rising to sit beside her on the bed. Sleep already seemed to be creeping up on Nell Jones. All the blood rushing to her head as he carried her to the disturbingly botanically themed room had likely been the only thing combating the Rohypnol or whatever drug was saturating her system and keeping her awake.

Callen looked away from the supine analyst, studying the vine motif of the wallpaper with an undue interest. He traced the stems and leaves, buds and fully-bloomed flowers, trying to find the repeat of the pattern. As with all tasks, Callen approached the study with an intensity beyond the capability of the average person. What he really doing, however, was listening for Nell's breathing to change. Finally, it grew heavy and rhythmic, indicating unconsciousness had claimed her. Taking a fortifying breath, he turned his full attention back to the young woman.

The fireman's carry had perhaps been a mistake. Callen had managed to keep the skirt portion of her dress in place, but the drapey top had shifted when he tried to lay her down. A pink crescent peaked out from the dress, the edge of an areola that appeared to be a perfect match in hue and softness to the fabric. He quickly but delicately tugged at the miscreant material until Nell's alabaster breast was no longer exposed. She stirred, whimpering slightly but not waking. Good. If Nell were really to remember the events of the day, she didn't need to know she had inadvertently flashed her coworker on top of everything else (none of which was her fault, but doubtless would shame her anyway).

And he really should move his hand. Now.

It was far more difficult than it should've been to prevent his fingers from trailing over the swell of breast, from brushing the stiffened nipple obvious through the thin, clingy fabric. God help him, he knew it wasn't right to ogle the sleeping woman, but Callen couldn't help but contemplate the pert, round breasts as they flattened and settled against their owner's recumbent chest, rising and falling in fluid motion with her inhalations and exhalations. It was something he hadn't witnessed in a while and it captivated him. How sad was that? It had been how many -he couldn't honestly remember- women ago that he had last beheld breasts in their natural, non-augmented state. Some said bigger was better, but Callen was definitely witnessing first hand the magnificence of smaller. Soft and supple. Yet perky. A handful. A mouthful. That's all a man needed.

He pulled his hand away as if he'd been burned. He shook his head to rid himself of the unsolicited lewd suggestions that had sprung up in the primal part of his brain, but they only seemed to dislodge and rattle about.

It was a toss up as to which was more startling; the fact that he was seeing Nell in a new light, as a physically desirable woman, or the fact that it didn't feel so very wrong like it probably should. Being shocked by suddenly noticing her sexual appeal one day when he had never before considered it wasn't derogatory to Nell. At least, it wasn't that the older man -for that's certainly what he was- had ever thought her _unappealing_. He simply hadn't ever previously studied her with _those _sort of criteria in mind. The young woman's personality was undeniably attractive to every person she met. Callen could not see anyone disliking Nell Jones, except perhaps out of jealously over her optimism, confidence and extreme intelligence. And speaking as a world-weary middle-aged man prone to bouts of cynicism and moodiness, she was sweet in that rare way which never annoyed. Which was likely due to the dry humor she possessed, one seemingly incongruous with such sincerely saccharine behavior, and yet perfectly mated within the young woman. Once he had gotten over his resistance to change (odd, yes, for someone so very good at fluid and unpredictable undercover operations to be so obstinate, but he liked to have control over the small sphere that comprised G. Callen's actual life), he had more than accepted the petite, quirky intelligence analyst. He liked her.

And now he saw her differently and was afraid he could never go back. Oh, she had always stood out in his mind as separate from other women. Callen had thought it was due to her unique personality, fierce intelligence and the context in which their relationship existed. Nell Jones had never popped up on is radar as someone who required charming. And without the need to flirt with the young woman, even superficially (which he honestly had appreciated more than he'd ever admit, being able to just be himself around her) he had never even approached evaluating her for seduction purposes. But upon consideration, Nell Jones stood out physically as well. One would think small, girlish looking women would be those that went unnoticed. But in Los Angeles, where nearly every woman was the perfect ideal of leggy, curvy, large-breasted, tanned and bleach-blonde, Nell was an anomaly. Her naturally alabaster skin was like marble, but not cold at all, it retained a healthy glow. Her hair was auburn, not strikingly red, not brazenly brunette, and cut in a quirky way that suited her. Normally, she dressed simply, in a style that obviously both appealed to and was most comfortable for her, rather than choosing clothes she thought would please others.

Except that goddamn dress she had thrown on had knocked the world slightly off its axis. Well, G. Callen's world. Because thinking about Nell Jones' breasts in no way fit into the agent's neat little construct of the universe. And so he really needed to stop staring (like some sort of creep) at the sleeping woman.

Callen forced himself to his feet and did a quick pace of the room. What he required was something to do, something to distract him. Oh, he had an agenda for the day, including tracking down anyone who might have wanted to take advantage of his -_their_- intelligence analyst. But he outright refused to leave Nell alone, possibly in a heavy state of unconsciousness in the hotel room. What if she was worse off than he thought? What if her blood pressure took a dangerous drop? Or if she vomited in her sleep and choked? What if someone came looking for her?

He had brought a laptop with him, but left the bulky portion of his kit in the trunk of the car. A man rushing to find and make amends to his girlfriend at a wedding wouldn't lug a laptop along with him. But if he had a laptop, he could get Eric to tie him into their network and he could help the others sift through the guest list while Nell slept off her intoxication. And then it occurred to him that this was Nell. He located the tidy stack of her luggage in a corner of the room. On top was -_big surprise- _a laptop case. He brought it over to the small table, pulled up a chair that made him feel like he was about to sink into a hydrangea bush, and extracted the sleek computer. Callen sighed in relief at recognizing it as one of the office's laptops rather than Nell's own personal device. He was certain in this fact not because they branded their property with any obvious marking, but because he'd seen her typing intently away at her own laptop before. It had been bright pink with some sort of Japanese comic book characters on the skin. He looked over at the slumbering young woman and smiled. Whereas her partner often displayed awkwardness or outright embarrassment over his nerdy tendencies, Nell knew who she was and was unapologetic about it. He frowned. Nell's normally cream-complexion was still flushed. He'd have to keep an eye on her temperature.

After setting up the computer (having his suspicions on its origins confirmed when their network log-in popped up and he was able to gain easy access to the system with his ID and password), and calling Eric to arrange for him to help them research the guest list, Callen went to check on his poor ward. Nell's temperature definitely was running a little high. Her cheeks were pink, and there were beads of sweat on her forehead and the exposed expanse of skin between her breasts. Before returning to the names on the guest list, Callen went into the bathroom, soaked a washcloth with cold water and spent several minutes applying it to Nell's hot skin, trying to cool her. He left it folded neatly on her forehead for good measure, took her pulse and was reassured she wasn't actually in any danger, and then delved into tracking the wealthy elite's digital spoor.

* * *

**A/N: What will happen when Nell wakes up…? In a hotel room…? With Agent Callen…?**


	12. Part 4, Chapter 3

**Author's Note: Apology for the wait for an update, but we tend to get quite into Halloween… Also, probably should apologize for being a tease, but I just can't resist a dream sequence (particularly a drug-induced one).**

**On another note, I know some have mentioned it, and I totally agree, there is a tendency to write Nell all damsel-in-distress like. And I have admittedly written her more helpless than she is in canon/the show (due to being drugged in this fic), but it served my purposes. And I know I want this to end with Nell being her capable self (possibly with a side of ass-kicking). So I'll hope you'll bear with me until I get there.  
**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 4: The Collision**

**Chapter 3: In which The Tattooed Lady meets her Knight In Shining Armor… **

The Tattooed Lady bounded up the metal staircase two steps at a time. She burst through the cabin door, causing its rusted hinges to screech in protest.

"What's happening?" she asked, demand mingling with anxiety in her voice. She knew that if she were to look in a mirror, 'fear' would be written all over her face. Quite literally. Her tattoos were an ever changing expression of her thoughts and feelings, leaving her utterly exposed to anyone that took the time to read her.

The handsome man at the wheel of the great cargo ship did not respond.

The Tattooed Lady approached the helm, surveying the instrumentation with -while maybe not expert, at least novice eyes.

"Why have we veered off course?"

The obvious change in direction, a complete 180 degree turn, had required the great noisy engines to cut on the port side, and the whole ship had lurched severely, scattering cards and poker chips everywhere and upsetting The Human Snake's tenuous calm. As soon as the jarring motion had calmed somewhat, she had sprinted for the control room, leaving the fortune teller and kooch dancers to clean up the mess.

"You may be the captain for the moment," The Tattooed Lady said. "But this is _my _boat."

Said 'captain' turned his head slowly to face his accuser, bright green eyes fixating upon her with terrifying intensity. A menacing smile slowly crossed his face.

"We're going for a little ride, Princess," he said.

"Stop. Stop this boat now!"

She could feel fury flit across her brow and combat 'fear' for a foothold.

The Cheshire grin of the green-eyed monster only deepened.

"As you wish," the captain said, his hands moving like lightening flashes across the controls. There was a great, horrible cacophony of metal grinding against metal, ending in the blistering crack of an explosion. The entire vessel shook, and moved neither to resume its original course or the new route the captain had set them upon.

"Sabotage!" The Tattooed Lady was in shock. She had trusted this Jack, typical sailor though he was, to safely ferry the traveling circus, _her_ circus, her _life_ across the ocean.

"You didn't seem inclined to go where I wanted to take you." His green eyes flashed. "So you aren't going anywhere."

He laughed.

"Except for maybe a swim."

The Tattooed Lady threw herself at the malevolent, green-eyed fraud of a captain. Vindictive bastard! She was going to kill him.

"You can't kill me," he said, catching her wrists and holding her arms still. He seemed amused rather than afraid. "What would my sister say?"

The ink covered body sagged and her arms were released, words such as 'defeat' and 'bitterness' visible against the alabaster skin. And then the swirling, scrolling monologue thrummed, the nature of the language changing with its possessor's mood.

"You aren't going to win so easily," The Tattooed Lady said. And then she was out the screeching metal door like the Human Cannonball soaring across the big top. Pounding back down the rickety stairs and across the metal deck, she reached the garishly red and white striped circus tent and entered with a flurry of candy stripe tent flap. The creatures inside had sensed that something was wrong, and had been chattering and fidgeting. They all stopped upon seeing their mistress. Except for Bruno.

The large bear rushed the bars of his cage, growling.

"Hey, the jig is up, doll. You wants to move it so as we cans gets outta here before we're all sleepin' wit' the fishes?"

Although she disliked the fat, slovenly creature immensely, feeling some sort of instinctual fear in his presence, Bruno the Bear did have a point. She could feel the vessel lurching disconcertingly beneath her feet. 'Panic; blazed across her skin. Then 'Calm Determination'. The Tattooed Lady rushed about the large tent, opening cages and urging her menagerie of creatures to flee. However, she hesitated before the last of the great steel crates, staring contemplatively at the ursine contained within. A very deep, primal part of her demanded she pass this one by, that she run in the opposite direction. But she was the mistress of this crazy circus, and she had a responsibility to every creature in her care. She reached out for the latch.

A leather-gloved hand caught hers, engulfed her petite fingers entirely and stayed them from their task.

"Not this one," the hand's owner said. The Tattooed Lady looked at the man who had stopped her from releasing Bruno the Bear. Blue eyes pierced her soul. She felt some sense of recognition over those captivating blues, but did not know the man who drew her away from the cage that contained a now extremely irate predator that was growling and slathering and issuing forth any number of curses in Chicago slang.

"Who are you?" She asked. "How did you get on my boat?"

The man was a knight-in-shining-armor, and his expression seemed to give her that precise answer to her question. Except, he wasn't wearing a shining suit of armor. Instead, he had a worn chain mail shirt, a tattered tunic, and beat-up leather leggings. A broad sword hung at his hip. He had a dangerous edge to him and yet looked at her softly.

"Come on," The Blue Eyed Knight said, grasping her elbow and urging her from the tent.

"What about the others?" She tried to dig her heels in, but he was larger than her petite self, and physically stronger, too. Thus she was propelled forward, but determined as she was, she protested greatly. "What about the man who betrayed me?"

"There's no time."

She turned to flee when his attention briefly shifted focus to the dark water on the other side of the railing. Dark water that was no longer so far below as it once had been. Obviously, the knight was not so distracted, however, for he caught her by the waist, pulled her tight to his body and then jumped over the edge of the ship.

Terror engulfed the unwilling diver as they plunged into the deep ocean water, and she thought for certain they would sink like a rock. Her knight was wearing enough metal to keep a foundry in the pink for quite a time. They did not plummet into the watery abyss, however, but bobbed back to the surface of the turbulent water surrounding the sinking ship. Somehow, The Blue Eyed Knight swam away from the undertow of the drowning vessel, pulling his ungrateful 'damsel' along with him.

The Tattooed Lady watched as the two feet high lettering on the stern disappeared into the inky water, and the 'Nell Jones' sank into the darkness.

She suddenly felt very cold.

* * *

**A/N: Okay, promise we get Nell's reaction to waking up from her little… 'nap' not alone. **


	13. Part 5, Chapter 1

**Author's Note: A little short, I know… but I work better this way sometimes.**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 5: The Awakening**

**Chapter 1: In which Nell awakes in an unfamiliar place with a familiar person…**

Nell Jones felt cold. Cold and damp. She swam to the surface of consciousness with the feeling that she had just been plunged into the depths of a freezing, black ocean. She opened her eyes only to promptly squeeze them shut and groan. The second attempt was slightly more effective. She actually managed to hold her eyes open for a few seconds and almost focus on the world.

She still felt cold and damp. Specifically... her forehead. She reached a hand to her brow and found the source; a wet cloth. Pulling it off and feeling more comfortable, Nell thought she'd give her eyes another try. The light was soft, and there were... vines? Was she in a thicket?! Fallen asleep for a hundred years like Rip Van Winkle?

Nell tried to sit up for a better view, but made it nowhere quickly, flopping back down with a groan. Her head! It felt like the inside of her skull had swelled several sizes whilst her cranium remained rigid, inflexible and about to split open under the internal pressure. What the hell was going on?!

Memories that would provide the answer seemed beyond elusive. Her head was throbbing so badly, it was all she could do to form the questions as to her situation, let alone ascertain the answers.

Okay, one more try. One more try and then she would just give up, fall back into that cold blackness. It seemed preferable to the pounding, pulsating, painful world.

Oh, frig it!

Nell tried to curl into the fetal position, but something heavy on her shoulder held her in place. Her heart leapt into her throat. And whereas her eyes were sluggishly resistant before, a surge of adrenaline and terror caused them to shoot open now. She wasn't alone!

Blue eyes in a familiar face calmed her nerves, but only for a moment.

Agent Callen?! What the hell was going on?!

"Welcome back to the world of the living."

Nell winced at the sound even though he had whispered the greeting to her, apparently more knowledgeable of her condition than she was. This time when she struggled to sit up, strong hands aided her, adjusting pillows (_pillows! She was in a bed!_) behind her. The world spun a bit as her head protested the movement. Closing her eyes, she took a deep breath, and it subsided to its perpetual throb.

Any sense of serenity was fleeting however, for as soon as there was a free neuron in her aching brain, it was set to panicking fiercely. _Think, Nell. Think._ She was apparently in a bed -well, more _on _it than _in _it, but in an unfamiliar room nonetheless. _With Agent Callen_. He'd been sitting on the edge of the bed. She felt the mattress shift, indicating this was no longer the case. She cracked open one eye to see him disappear around a corner and heard the sound of a faucet being turned on. Okay. Not so bad. They were in some sort of hotel room, which could be very _bad_ in a number of ways, inappropriate and embarrassing ways. But he'd been fully clothed, in a rather flattering charcoal grey suit and blue shirt that matched his captivating eyes and... _stop_!

Nell checked herself. She was dressed... barely! Looking down she saw mostly skin and... sans bra! She'd never left the confines of her own home without proper undergarments before in the entirety of her life. What had she been thinking when she picked this dress out for Trish's wedding?

Trish's wedding.

She was at the country club. This was the hotel. The wedding. She remembered the wedding. But... what happened later? How had Callen gotten here? How had she gotten into the hotel room... with him?

Just because they were fully clothed _now_... No. He would never. Oh! And neither would she. Not with Callen. No. But just because she felt a ball of panic swelling up in her chest again, Nell concentrated for a moment on her body. Everything seemed normal. She was pretty certain she'd feel it, the ache of using certain long-neglected muscles, had they'd...

The faucet had shut off a while ago and she heard footsteps signaling Callen's return. Her skin turned hot as a blush swept over her upon his reappearance.

_Ridiculous, Nell! You're ridiculous!_

When he sat down on the edge of the bed beside her once more, she felt the blush deepen from embarrassment. How could she ever think the man would have sex with her when she'd obviously been in some sort of state that she couldn't even remember afterward? How could she think he'd ever be interested in having sex with her at all? It was obvious he did not consider her in that way, that he sometimes barely tolerated her, and other times appeared to not know what to make of her at all.

No. Nothing of the sort had happened between them, which actually raised far more questions. If it wasn't a simple drunken lapse in judgment fling between the sheets, then...

"What the hell's going on?" Nell asked, wincing at the croaking sound of her voice.

Callen held out a hand. "Here. These should help with the headache without reacting badly to whatever's still lingering in your system."

She took the offered aspirin and popped them in her mouth, gratefully accepting the glass of water he held out to her next. Somehow she didn't choke on the extremely large gulp of satisfyingly cool and wet liquid. Greedily, she down the entire glass, feeling her parched mouth and throat soothed immensely for her hydration gluttony.

"Look at me," the senior agent in the room ordered. Nell gave him a confused look but then obeyed, as his stare turned clinical and she realized he wanted to examine her. There were worst things to stare into than gorgeous blue eyes. Becoming slightly entranced, she jumped when his fingers grazed her neck, searching out her pulse. He looked away, focusing on the expensive looking watch around his wrist.

Nell tried to be patient, knowing the way the man was, that he wouldn't answer any of her questions, tell her what was going on, until he was good and ready to do so. He touched the back of his hand to her cheek and then her forehead, and she was immensely grateful he had checked her pulse first because she felt her heart rate quicken at the gentle touch.

"You seem better," he announced after what seemed an eternity of deliberation. Nell bit her lip in order not to exclaim her demand for information. What was a clueless intelligence analyst, after all? A joke, that's what!

"How do you feel?" he asked, looking concerned and relieved at the same time, which Nell would've thought impossible, yet there it was on his face. One layered over the other. Concern in his blue eyes, relief softening the corner of his mouth.

"Like my head is about to develop its own gravitational pull."

Callen chuckled and Nell smiled stupidly.

"So. Are you going to fill me in on what's going on?" she asked. "I'm assuming you weren't on the guest list. I know we don't have many non-work related conversations, Agent Callen, but I thought you'd be polite enough to mention that you were also attending a wedding today, the _same_ wedding. Perhaps we could've carpooled? Were you on the bride's side or the groom's?"

Nell would like to blame the rambling on the disarrayed state of her grey matter, but that would be a lie. She had always possessed a tendency to ramble, especially when under stress. Only after working with Eric, who seemed to suffer the same affliction, had she realized how uneasy it made every else around the rambler as well and had been trying to train herself otherwise. When it came to such circumstances as these, however...

Callen only smiled and gave her that damned amused, questioning look of his. He said nothing, the bastard!

"You know I know how to use a gun, right?" she asked. This earned her another smile. And then his expression turned grim.

"I take it you don't remember much of what happened earlier today?"

Nell nodded slowly, a 'Duh! That's why I was asking you' look on her face.

"You were drugged, Nell..."

* * *

**A/N: See, if we break here, then we can easily bypass retelling of events we're already aware of… :-)**


	14. Part 5, Chapter 2

**A/N: Apologies for the **_**really **_**long delay (And thanks to anyone still interested in this fic). I was busy, and the horribly, horribly distracted by writing some unabashedly Callen/Nell smut. Hopefully, I got it out of my system, because I didn't want this fic to progress (in a shippy manner) too quickly.**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 5: The Awakening**

**Chapter 2: In which Nell's memory refuses to cooperate, Hetty and Callen are at odds, and Nell's stilettos are MIA…**

Nell could only stare dumbfounded at the field agent when he'd finished telling her all he knew about the events of the day, about a man they believed she may have stumbled upon doing something illegal, a mobster named D'Arcangelis.

_You trying to catch flies with that trap?_

Her mother's voice scolded from inside Nell's head, causing her to close her mouth and press her lips into a thin line as she concentrated. The headache -apparently caused by someone slipping her a mickey (oddly appropriate if mobsters were truly involved), had subsided somewhat, but memories still had failed to return. Even with Callen's retelling.

As far as they (Callen, Kensi and the other agents) could make out, Nell had attended the ceremony in full retention of her faculties, and then proceeded to have a couple glasses of champagne with the bride's brother, Nell's ex-boyfriend, Jack Worthington. Feeling funny, she had excused herself and sought out the ladies' room, asking the desk clerk 'Johnny' for directions along the way. Somehow, she'd made it there, called Kensi for assistance and barricaded the door. But judging by what she'd told Kensi, it was likely she'd run into D'Arcangelis somewhere in that sequence of events.

"I'm sorry, Callen," Nell said. "I can't seem to remember."

"That's not your fault. Don't worry about it." A hand squeezed her bare shoulder reassuringly and then was quickly removed.

_'Not your fault' _and _Don't worry about it_? That did not sound like the Callen she knew. Normally, he'd push a witness to try to remember everything they possibly could. Albeit gently, he_ would _be pressuring them for information.

"Maybe so..." she said. The agent had that impatient, antsy look on his face, like a cornered animal. She could tell he just wanted to get out of there. If they left the hotel, however, they might lose whatever chance there was of catching this D'Arcangelis. "But it could be important. Just give me a moment. I want to try."

Callen scrubbed a hand over his face and nodded. "Okay."

Nell closed her eyes, concentrating on taking a slow, deep breath and releasing it. She did this several times, as she had learned to do when she'd suffered mild panic attacks her senior year of high school because the pressure had been getting to her. It was a very useful tool, effectively allowing her to forget all outside concerns and stressors. When she felt calmer, she focused on the last clear memory she held of the day.

The sight of Trish walking down the aisle. She'd been breathtaking, achingly beautiful. But not because of the designer dress perfectly tailored to the young woman's figure. Not because of the tasteful, professionally done make-up and hair. And not because of the pristine, elegant setting for the wedding. The beauty of her friend in that moment transcended the physical. It stemmed from the pure blissful happiness evident in her eyes, her smile, every minute movement of her body. It was a perfect moment.

Everything that followed was lovely, of course, but that moment... it was one of those rare ones that made a person grateful for simply being alive.

But it had also filled Nell with a complex mix of emotions. Happiness for her friend, awe for the magnificence of life, jealousy of the joy her friend had found, an ache to have the same thing in her own life. A desire to be noticed, not to be alone...

Which had led her to agreeing to have a drink with an old friend.

Friend?! Not hardly!

Nell's eyes shot open.

"That bastard drugged me!" She jumped to her feet, with no precise plan in mind but the need to track down Jack Worthington and do... well, do something _drastic_ overwhelming her.

However, Callen caught her before she reached the door, which she was simultaneously grateful for and angry about.

"Calm down, Nell," he soothed. Damn the special agent and his charm. She briefly flashed on the look he'd given her when she first walked out in that goddamn dress back at OSP headquarters. It was worth it just for that look. How many times had she wished for a man to give her a look like that, for that specific man to look at her like... Wait! What?!

The memories were coming too quickly, were too muddled. Callen guided her to a plush chair hiding camouflaged in the corner of the hotel room. She collapsed into it, holding her head, and moaning softly.

"Take it easy," he said, crouching before her and looking up into her face. God, his eyes were blue. "Don't push yourself too hard."

"Why can't I remember?" she asked. "Everything's so hazy and confused."

"Whatever they gave you," Callen said. "It wasn't aspirin. Its effects could be everything from dehydration to severe blackout and memory loss. Your memory might not come back at all."

He was right, of course. Nell knew about the type of drugs men slipped into women's drinks. By the time she was in college, it was a major issue of campus life and they'd had a lecture so long in it that she thought they should've just made it a mandatory 3 credit course: 'How to avoid date rape and scumbags in general.' Useful material to cover for any young woman. Maybe it'd be better for high school. The earlier girls learned what life sometimes might throw at a woman, the better. Maybe just a class in 'Life's many surprises: Be prepared'. If she were designing it, Nell would certainly put a section in about how to deal with broken, badass secret agents that looked at you in the most curious manner with the bluest goddamn eyes you'd ever seen. Because she sure as hell could use some advice about what to do with that.

Suddenly, there was a loud chirping noise that made her start. Callen's hand patted her knee, her bare knee, and she felt another, different sort of shock jolt through her.

"Just the others," he said, rising to his feet and approach the laptop set up on the small circular table in the other corner of the room. "Maybe they found something." He glanced back at Nell, gestured for her to get up. "Hey, come here. Eric's going to want to see that you're okay. He wasn't exactly taking my word for it."

Nell smiled and moved to sit beside him facing the screen of the laptop she remembered toting along. Little snoop. How much else of her luggage had he gotten into? Obviously, not that much, considering he'd given her generic aspirin that doubtless came from the hotel's stock rather than what she carried in her pack.

Callen clicked on a desktop icon she remembered setting up on the company systems for the less technically savvy to have easy access to the teleconferencing application.

Eric's face popped up on screen, the ops room in the background. Nell smiled at the familiar site of her partner and workplace. This had been such a crazy day, that it grounded her a little to think of the place where she practically lived over 350 days of the year.

"Nell, you're alright!" Eric exclaimed, big grin plastered across his face. It faltered a little. "You are, right? Alright, that is?"

"Yes, Eric. I'm fine."

"Good. Because from what Kensi had said... I... I... um... I mean what if D'Arcangelis discovered you were a federal agent. I mean those mobsters _really_ don't like us feds. You could've just disappeared and we'd-"

Callen interrupted the younger man's rambling, which saved the uncomfortable blush from deepening across Nell's face. Her partner's blatant crush on her could create some seriously awkward moments.

"Enough, Eric. We get it. You were worried about her," Callen said. "Have you got anything for us yet?"

"Um... not really."

"Then we're coming in."

Eric did that nervous swallow thing of his. Nell had seen it enough times to immediately recognize it for what it was. Her partner was being placed in a socially awkward situation.

As if on cue, Hetty appeared over Eric's shoulder and the camera shifted to focus entirely upon her.

"Don't be so hasty, Mr. Callen."

Nell started, felt her cheeks grow warm at the sight of her boss. Who _didn't_ know about the mess she'd gotten into? Well, it made sense in a way. Knight-errants got their quests from somewhere. And it looked like the Old Queen had dispatched her bravest on Nell's behalf. No. Hetty was more like a wizard. And not just any wizard. She was a Merlin, without a doubt. The thought of the diminutive old woman casting powerful spells and directing kings seemed very appropriate. Even though Nell was certain Hetty would be lost swimming in the abundance of robes wizards tended to favor (like Mickey in Fantasia).

Nell giggled. She just couldn't help herself. And who could blame her?

Okay. Well, apparently both Callen and Hetty could blame her. Because they were giving her such _looks_.

"You see?" Callen said, seeming to resume arguing some point, the beginning of which Nell had been daydreaming too much to notice. Her mind did seem to be wandering more than usual today. Or was it just since she'd been... _drugged. _A flash of anger coursed through her at the thought.

"She's in no condition for this."

Nell glanced at the man sitting beside her. He radiated tension and looked to be on the edge of becoming very angry indeed. And an Angry Agent Callen was never a good thing. (_In particular, if you're a bad guy, _Nell thought.) But this time he seemed to be angry with Hetty, which was unsettling. Oh, they'd had tiffs before. But Nell had never seen them quite this severely at odds. And over her, of all things?

Well then, she could put an end to this argu-um, _discussion_.

Nell placed a hand on Callen's arm and he stopped mid-tirade about knowingly placing compromised agents in harm's way. He looked down at where her fingers rested upon his forearm, and then up into her face, wearing the oddest expression before his features became stoically unreadable. Very strange.

"I can do this," she said, looking directly into those enigmatic blue eyes, before turning her attention to the old spy on the computer screen. "I _want _to do this. I mean, we need to stop this D'Arcangelis, don't we?"

Hetty nodded her head, a slight smile making itself known. She obviously approved of Nell's tenacity. Callen obviously did not.

"We can figure out another way," he said, his voice almost a growl. "We don't need Nell. She doesn't remember anything and I'm already in. If anyone asks, I can even tell them the truth, that she's not feeling well."

"Mr. Callen."

Hetty didn't have to say more. The message was clear in her tone. She'd heard his opinion and she did not care to discuss it further. The admonished agent stood and walked away, silently fuming. Nell watched with wide eyes as Callen picked up his SIG off a side table (overgrown with stenciled ivy) and began to strip the weapon down with precise movements that seemed a little excessively forceful.

It was an impressive thing to witness. Nell had never really watched, just watched any of the agents attack a firearm with such absent determination. Oh, they could all accomplish the task in more than an efficient manner (she granted herself the rank of proficient for that matter). But this... Agent Callen could easily carry out the procedure blindfolded and, Nell did not doubt, just as precisely as he currently were doing. Having completed the disassembly in a matter of seconds, he now appeared to be cleaning the base components of the weapon. The movements of his sure hands were more than simply practiced. They were ingrained. And oddly enough, elegant.

Nell had to blink her eyes and will herself to turn away from the scene that entranced her when it finally registered that Hetty was calling her name from across cyberspace (and on the laptop directly before her).

"I'm sorry, Hetty. What were you saying?" Sometimes Nell hated being so fair of complexion. She just knew the blush was apparent on her skin. Hetty, god bless her, continued on as if the young woman hadn't been blatantly staring at her colleague instead of paying attention to her boss.

"Do you not recall encountering Mr. D'Arcangelis at all earlier in the day?"

"Um..." Nell strained through all the faces and names she'd been inundated with before that stupid, aggravatingly blank spot in her memory. "I-I don't know. I don't remember the name."

"Perhaps this will jog something in your sorely abused memory, Miss Jones." Hetty nodded to someone off screen, probably Eric. Definitely Eric, because in another second a photo popped up in a new window.

"The Bear!" Nell exclaimed before she could even process the words that burst from her mouth. She had no clue what it meant, but it obviously meant something. Or, she hoped wasn't the case, she had spontaneously developed a case of tourette's.

"You've seen this man, my dear?" Hetty asked, looking somewhat concerned over the outburst.

"Yes. I think so." Nell closed her eyes took a deep breath. A dark space. The smell of dust and moth balls. The low, grumbling murmur of men's voices. "A coat check!"

Nell smiled broadly, one returned in not quite the same intensity but in just as genuine pleasure from her boss.

"I was hiding in the coat check closet, Hetty. That's when I saw him."

Nell's sixth sense tingled and she knew Callen had come to stand behind her. Well, besides the hairs raised on the back of her neck, she could smell the gun oil on his hands, and that uniquely 'Callen' scent she could never quite determine the origins of.

"I'll check it out," Callen said.

"Take Nell with you, Agent Callen."

She didn't want to look. But neither did she need to do so. Nell could _feel_ the tension rise up once more in the other agent. The room seemed to get warmer, stiller, stifling. It was too oppressive for the likes of her, who generally wanted everyone to get along. So Nell nodded her head in acknowledgement of Hetty's order (for that's what it was) and stood, began searching for her shoes. She heard Callen move towards the door.

Hetty cleared her throat. Callen sighed audibly.

"Don't worry, Hetty. She's coming with me," Callen said. Being discussed in such a manner was really, really starting to get on Nell's nerves. But she bit her tongue. She had no desire whatsoever to push Callen over the edge. So she bent down to check under the bed for her mislaid footwear. "But if I think she's in any danger. We're done."

"As the senior field agent, that is your call to make," Hetty said. There was warning in that tone, against precisely what, Nell couldn't say. "Contact us when you find something."

There was the sound of the teleconferencing program closing, and then the click of Callen shutting the laptop.

"I put your shoes in the closet," Callen said, so close in her ear she jumped slightly. And then his hand was on her bicep, helping her to her feet. She hazarded a glance at his face. His expression was still rather grim but seemed to be softening by the moment. Finally, it turned into his playful grin.

"You might want to straighten up a bit," he said in his teasing tone. "Or those hoity-toity friends of yours are going to wonder where you've been and what you've been up to."

_But now with whom_, she thought, remembering the plan Callen had explained they formulated to get him in to the wedding (to retrieve her intoxicated ass). The charming agent had pretended, was still pretending to be her boyfriend. Her boyfriend with whom she had disappeared into her hotel room for several hours. The thought made her uncomfortably warm in regions it should not, and she was thankful for the excuse to flee to the bathroom for a minute.

Oh, hell. She did look like she had quite the tumble between the sheets. Her dress was -gasp!- rumpled. Nothing she would normally care about, but with this set... She tugged at the hem and various seams until it was not only laying where it should, but looked almost presentable. Then she finger-combed the bed-head out of her hair. God, was she ever prone to messy hair with this cut. She almost pined for that long straight hair she sported up until college. It was so much less maintenance. Just pull it back into a tail and go. Of course, she looked a hundred times cuter (if she did say so herself) with the short hair. She touched up her make-up and felt like maybe she could face the world again, even track down some bad guys.

When she emerged from the bathroom, Callen was looking as smooth and put-together as he always did. (Curse him!) Nell tugged at her hem again, feeling significantly rumpled in comparison. He was holding her shoes in his hand, but when she went to reach for them, he got down on one knee and wrapped his firm fingers gently about her ankle. Shocked, she could only oblige by lifting her foot and letting him slide the little strappy stiletto on. He fastened the small clasp and then proceeded to do the other before Nell's brain started working again.

"You're going to put wrinkles in Hetty's suit," she blurted out. _Stupid, Nell! Stupid!_

"I think it will survive," he said with a wink, rising to his feet once more and brushing off the knees of the grey Italian silk. "And so will Hetty."

He took her hand, entwined her arm with his, placing her fingers on her forearm in classic 'escorting a lady' fashion. Then he looked at her with those _blue_ eyes of his.

"C'mon, darling. Let's check out this coat check I've heard so much about."

_Darling?! _Gulp.

* * *

**A/N: As always, I gave this the best edit (or two) I could, but for some reason my brain kept switching tenses on me whilst writing this one, so some might have slipped through. Hopefully, it was still comprehensible. **

**A/N2: This chapter was a little slow, I know, but we needed to transition to more exciting stuff (Coming soon, I promise!).**


	15. Part 5, Chapter 3

**Author's Note: Sorry about the wait. So many projects and so little time! But I haven't forgotten or lost interest in this fic (or my other Callen/Nell stories). And there will be more to this, hopefully with less time between updates (but not guarantees).**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 5: The Awakening**

**Chapter 3: In which Nell feels a bit off-balance, a coat check is explored and something unexpected happens…**

Nell Jones suffered from social anxiety. But didn't everyone to a degree? Human beings were social creatures. It was their evolutionary adaptation. And they'd developed social interaction to such a complex degree that socializing could be nerve wracking to many a person. Especially with relatively unfamiliar people in new and unknown scenarios. Such as pretending to be romantically involved with a man you actually knew little about, at a wedding filled with strangers to you, taking place in a hotel you'd never been to before, and -oh, yeah- bad guys lurking about.

Yes, the control freak in Nell was freaking out. It wasn't that she was not a curious person. It wasn't that she had no interest in new experiences and adventures. It was simply that her brain was wired for organization. And it abhorred chaos, a lack of control. Nell liked having new experiences. She _was _a curious person in search of adventure. But she liked to be _prepared_.

And she was most definitely _not_ prepared for the proximity of Agent G. Callen as he escorted her down the stairs. She was not prepared for the subtle scent of him flooding her nose and lungs, making her head swim. She was not prepared for the warmth of his body beside hers. And she was most definitely not prepared for the warmth rising within her in response to the man's closeness.

Her hip brushed against his side periodically as they walked.

She _tried_ to focus on the task at hand.

"We should start at the reception desk and head towards the restroom where you found me," she said as she simultaneously concentrated on taking each step of the hardwood staircase in her stilettos. She could have done it without thinking, but there was a possibility that _drug_ still remained in her system, making her more unsteady than she realized. It honestly wasn't to keep her mind busy so it didn't consider the hand that had released her arm to rest at the small of her back.

"Agreed," he said. The hand slid to wrap around her waist.

_Oh, Lord._

Ironically, Callen must have mistook her slow, hesitant steps for the drug lingering in her system rather than the attempt to distract herself it had been. And now she really could think of nothing else but Callen's arm wrapped about her, his hand placed firmly on her waist to steady her. It was solid. Strong and warm. And seemingly large on her diminutive figure.

For much of her life, Nell had hated being smaller than most everyone else. People always viewed her as much younger than she was, or weaker, or even inconsequential. She had finally reached a time in her life where she had earned the respect of those around her, felt accepted and appreciated. No longer treated like a strange outsider, a child to be sidelined when the adults were talking. But despite all that she'd had to deal with over being 'short' and 'tiny', there had always been benefits to being petite. Such as when a man held her, he could _really_ hold her. She could be enveloped entirely by the object of her affection. It was such a comfort, a pleasure to have her world reduced to just the two of them, that single embrace. His warmth, his heartbeat, his scent, the rumble of words deep in his chest... Mm, it had been a while, such a long while... More than that, though, a single touch involved so much contact for her. Callen may only have had a single hand on her, but it engaged a vast expanse of skin and nerves for Nell. Her whole side tingled beneath the warmth that seeped through the fabric of her dress. Not to even mention the places where the backless garment left her skin exposed to press directly against his palm.

Did he realize? Did he realize he was touching _so _much of her with that simple gesture. Surely he must feel beneath his hand the ridge of her lower ribs, the curve of her waist, the flare of her hip? He must know that with little difficulty he could dip a finger into her navel and tickle her. That his thumb was very slowly, almost imperceptibly stroking her back. How could he not?

Okay. So it really wasn't that big of a deal. A man supporting a potentially tipsy friend down the stairs. That's all it was. But it seemed like a big deal if only for the reason that G. Callen never touched her. Well, not _never_. Once in a great while, she would receive a squeeze on the shoulder in gratitude or acknowledgement of a job well done. More often, however, it was just words. 'Well done, Nell' and a smile. Of course, that _damn_ smile of his would be reward enough for any woman. Not that it did anything to her, of course. Because it didn't. It didn't make her smile involuntarily in return and feel giddy warmth bubble up inside of her. _Not at all_. And his hand on her waist was _certainly_ not making her head dizzy and her stomach fluttery. Nope. Nothing.

Apparently she'd been holding her breath because she nearly sighed in relief when they reached the bottom of the staircase and his hand released her. Although it slid across her back, sending a shiver up her spine. _Damn him_.

And then he draped an arm across her shoulders, his hand on her upper arm. Likely a much more comfortable posture given their difference in height. It still felt warm and solid on her bare skin, but much less distracting. The placement of his hand on her waist had been much too similar to how a man might take hold of her in far more intimate circumstances.

They made their way past the reception desk where Johnny still sat on duty.

"Feeling better, Miss Jones?" he asked with a cheeky grin. Nell did not have to fake the blush that colored her face.

"Yes. Thank you," she said.

An elbow to the ribs was likely called for when she caught Callen giving the boy a wink, but she'd been too shocked to reprimand the man. She knew he possessed a flirtatious side, but she'd never really encountered it before, let alone been the center of it. He gave her a teasing smile and knowing how she often telegraphed her emotions, she had to look away as they continued through the lobby area and proceeded down a hallway that didn't seem entirely unfamiliar. Then again, the hotel had the same 1920s rural retreat feel throughout. One oak paneled, oriental rug clad hallway was basically the same as the next.

Callen surreptitiously tried every closed door on the way, finding them all to be locked, as Nell progressed slowly down the ornate passage, feeling an intense sense of deja-vu. She lingered close by her 'boyfriend' in case there were any passersby to catch them trying some B&E and she needed to fake simpering drunk girlfriend needing help to reach the restroom. But everyone appeared to be elsewhere, in more lively parts of the hotel and country club grounds.

_There._

She put a hand on Callen's forearm as he tried the third uncooperative doorknob in a row. A flash of certainty had surged through her like a bolt of lightning. They were not only on the right track, but that door up ahead on the left...

"That one," she whispered to her companion when he gave her a curious glance, directing both their attention to the unadorned dark oaken door with brass hardware. With cautious glances, they made their way to the door in question. There were voices in the distance, the constant thrum and hub-bub of a large proceeding in the vicinity, but apparently no one nearby. Callen grasped the brass doorknob and looked to Nell, his expression serious and inquiring. She nodded.

Unlocked.

Which made perfect sense because... "They'd locked it behind them," she said after they were closed up alone in the dark little room. There was the noise of her fellow agent fumbling about and a weak light filled the small room. "But I unlocked it when I left. So..."

"Nobody's been in here since," Callen finished her sentence. Ha! She wasn't the only one picking up traits from her fellow agents. It felt good to think that she was an important enough part of the man's life for him to have adopted her little quirk of finishing other's sentences. Then again, they all picked up some of each other's traits for the simple fact that they spent so much of their time together.

"At least, not D'Arcangelis?" he asked, the implied question being whether she had seen them at all in this place. Nell turned a full circle, taking in the small space. Definitely a coat check, albeit an empty one.

"I came in here, thinking it was the bathroom," she said, trying not to force her memory too hard but rather let it flow naturally, and hopefully it wasn't too dammed up. Callen remained quiet. Yet somehow she knew he was listening intently to her even as he proceeded to methodically search the small space from top to bottom. It was his way.

"And then I heard footsteps."

Yes! Yes, that was it.

"I thought it must be Jack coming looking for me, for..."

Well, Callen certainly didn't need to hear what she thought the deceptively charming Mr. Worthington had wanted of her. Although it was likely he already knew. He seemed to know an awful lot about what had happened to Nell that day. More than she could remember. And more than he was letting on. What had she said or done when he'd found her? Best not think about embarrassment that may or may not be unfounded. It would only hinder her mercurial memory.

"I hid." Nell brushed past the agent who had fixed her with a curious gaze. She reached out and pushed on a piece of oaken paneling. It depressed a little and then the spring latch released and the seamlessly hidden door sprung open. "In here."

Callen raised a questioning eyebrow at her and she shrugged. It had seemed like a good idea at the time. _Did she really need to justify drug-induced behavior? _

The senior agent opened the cupboard door carefully, ducking his head inside. Apparently there was nothing to see because he emerged with a frown.

"You hid in there?" he asked. Again Nell shrugged, not knowing how to take the comment, as valid surprise or a teasing reference to her small stature. A small stature of which Callen was certainly aware.

"It wasn't pleasant, I suppose," she said, unconsciously crossing her arms in a defensive posture. She closed her eyes as memory took over. "But I was distracted by the men who entered. There were three of them. None of them were Jack, so I thought about showing myself, apologizing and leaving."

"But you didn't?" There was an edge of something more than curiosity to the question. Something along the lines of worry, maybe even the smallest twinge of fear. Fear for her person? She had no doubt the senior agent cared about his teammates, but until this day he'd never singled her out in particular to worry about.

"No," she said, curious to see how his posture relaxed ever so slightly.

"So you could probably identify them?" he asked. "But they wouldn't have any reason to suspect that you're anything more than a random guest here?"

Nell nodded her head. That was definitely something they could use to their advantage. They could mingle into the crowd of revelers and she could survey the guests for their suspects. But how did they know there was any reason to arrest the men even if she could identify them. She chewed her lip. Her headache was starting to return.

"What is it, Nell?" Callen asked, taking her gently by the shoulder and looking down into her face. She couldn't shake the feeling there _was_ a reason to stop these bad guys here and now. She _must_ have overheard something, but _what? _This dark little corner was certainly an ideal place to be planning something nefarious. Or... Or to _hide _something!

She snapped her fingers, an unconscious physical reaction to her epiphany moments. How many times had she startled Eric with the tick?

"Briefcase," she said. Callen gave her a questioning look. "They stashed a briefcase in here. Locked the door and left."

"You unlocked it to get out," he said. "And it was still unlocked when we came in here... Which means they probably haven't returned."

He began another circuit of the room, searching the obviously empty space. He turned to face her.

"So where's the briefcase?

Nell shrugged helplessly. She could see the item in question in her head, clear as day. Standard size, about 20 inches by 14 inches, and 6 inches deep. Black, crisp leather. Simple silver clasps. She described it to Callen, as if the description would help them identify it amongst the doubtless hundreds of just such accessories currently within the country club grounds. Nevertheless, the agent listened intently.

"Where-" he began to ask a question and then paused suddenly, putting a finger to his lips, cocking his head to the side as if listening to something.

"Footsteps," he whispered so low that he was practically mouthing the words. Her heart began beating more quickly, as her body responded to the rising tension she picked up in her companion's posture and tone. The blood pounding in her ears occluded any other sound, and even as she strained to hear, she could not identify the sound that had put Callen on alert.

"Sorry about this, Nell."

Her mouth opened in order to ask what Callen was apologizing for, but there was no time for the words to form on her lips. Instead, Nell found herself shoved bodily against the wall, her superior agent's hands _everywhere_, his body pressed in a terrifyingly intimate way against hers. And his _tongue_, it was in her mouth!

* * *

**A/N: Uh-oh! Kissy-kissy and who's about to walk in on them?**


	16. Part 5, Chapter 4

**Author's Note: Not going to lie. Totally had part of this chapter written at the very beginning of starting this fic. What? Did I write this fic only to make Callen and Nell make-out? Of course not! I would never! ;-)  
**

**Warning: Language. Borderline smut.**

**Well, o****n with the 'quickie' and hopefully I will have a longer chapter for you, and without too much wait (things are starting to get _interesting_).**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 5: The Awakening**

**Chapter 4: In which Callen takes his cover very seriously, and meets a Bear…**

Her body stiffened when Callen shoved Nell against the dark wood paneling of the wall. And then she softened wondrously against him. Her lips were velvety and supple. Her mouth warm and inviting. _Agent_ Callen melted away as he kissed the young woman. He was Callen Morris, repentant boyfriend, eager to make amends with his beautiful young girlfriend. But he wasn't submissive, either. He was going to show her how much he cared, how much he _needed_ her. Nell was _his_. Because god help him, he was hers. For she had called, and he had come running.

He had grabbed her waist and lifted her when he put her back to the wall, and he continued to grip the curve of her hard with his right hand. His left hand, however, hooked itself behind her knee and pulled her leg up to rest over his hip. In so doing, her body had opened entirely to him and he instinctively pressed into her where it counted, because she was _his, _damn it.

She. Was. _His_.

His hand slid up her leg, fingertips stroking the edge of her thigh-high pantyhose, hesitating as they came across the silkiness of ribbon. Pausing briefly in the nibbling of her neck, Callen smiled against her reddened skin. A garter belt. What was so fucking sexy about the garment, anyway? He didn't know that he cared the reason why it inspired lust, as his hand slid up her naked thigh, tracing the satin strap to where it joined the lace that covered her hip. And over that hip, following the contrast of the coarsely textured fabric against the satin smoothness of her bare skin. And then gliding over the firm round of her lace-clad buttocks.

He squeezed that full, fleshy part of her and growled as he ground harder into her.

She was _his_.

This was why G. Callen was such a good undercover agent. He was a broken man. There was no denying that fact. But being so had allowed him to compartmentalize the fragments of himself. There was so little definition to his real self, that it was easy to stuff it into a small corner of his mind and lock it away. He had no family. He had no real past. And it seemed like a very significant portion of his memories belonged to other people, the aliases he'd assumed throughout his life. The parts that were really him were insignificant and easy to push to the side when he assumed another identity. Not just assumed, _became_.

And yet he kept that federal agent's instinct perpetually about him. So despite being fully engaged by the succulent young woman in his embrace, Callen heard the footsteps that had originally alerted him to the danger as they approached and then slowed, and presently stopped outside of the oversized closet's door. He heard the door handle turn as he nipped at the tender flesh of her neck. Even with his back turned to the door, and with the pounding of blood in his ears and the near-panting of Nell's rapid breathing, he heard the door creak open and three (yes, three by the sounds of it) men enter.

"What's going on here?" a gruff voice asked. There were snickers from its companions. It was too soon yet to acknowledge the interlopers. Besides, he was doing such fine work on that supple, pale flesh covering her pulse point. And her core was so warm and inviting that it was wholly involuntary when he gripped her thigh harder and rocked his hips against hers. The friction was simultaneously satisfying and teasing. And for a moment he vehemently wished away the three men who he had a severe suspicion were the very thugs they were looking for.

"Hey, lovebirds. Break it up."

A meaty hand thumped down on Callen's shoulder and it was all he could do to prevent his instincts from taking over and neutralizing the threat. He reined in the urge to break the mug's arm, because this was in fact the effect he wanted to create. No secret government agents here, Mr. Mob Guy. Just a lascivious older man and his pretty young girlfriend making out in a coat check.

"What's the problem? Couldn't find your own corner to..." Callen trailed off, letting himself look a little bit afraid as he came face to face with the three menacing visages. They all easily had 50 pounds on him, and not soft pounds. The man who had spoken was most definitely the one from that grainy, three-quarter shot Eric had pulled from a surveillance photo. This was D'Arcangelis. And he was almost as large as Callen's ex-seal partner, and not nearly as friendly-looking. Callen always maintained a smooth confidence and optimism despite how cynically he viewed the world. Odd, perhaps, yes. But having experienced circumstances beyond his control all his life, he'd excepted the inevitability of certain events and had long ago decided to simply roll with the punches (in some cases, quite literally) because if you could be hurt, it meant you were still alive.

But he felt a little more niggling worry than he generally would have when facing a potentially futile violent situation. Because it wasn't just his safety at risk. There was Nell. Warm, soft Nell, with smooth skin and lips like… ahem. Anyway, he needed to pull this off without even the slightest suspicion of doubt working its way into the trio's heads. He stepped in front of the younger woman, just in case...

"Get a room," D'Arcangelis growled. Callen was beginning to see why Nell's intoxicated mind logged the man under 'bear'. His voice was beyond gruff, the words rumbled from the man's barrel chest, and his enunciation was poor. His face had the round, squashed face quality that sadly always seemed to correlate to a mean temper and lack of morality. No, charm had definitely not been how D'Arcangelis carved out a large chunk of the black market for himself.

"Good idea," Callen said, grabbing Nell's hand. "In fact, I believe we already have one. Don't we, babe?"

Nell looked completely shell-shocked. Her hazel eyes were big and round and rather unfocused. Her skin was a lovely pink, whether from the teasing he'd given her or from embarrassment at being caught in such a position, no one could say. Which was good for their cause. It seemed to really be selling it. He dragged her out of the coat check room, and as he passed by, he heard one of the thugs mutter to the other.

"I'd sure as hell like to get my hands on that little piece. No wonder the guy dragged her in here for a quickie."

Callen clenched his teeth against reacting to the comment and pretended to be escorting his fetching companion to their room until the door shut and the lock clicked behind them. Then he returned with a discombobulated Nell to put his ear to the door.

It sounded as if Goon Number Two was agreeing with his cohort's assertion about the desirability of Nell Jones' company.

"...don't usually find legs like that on a small chick. But y'know what you do get with the small bitches? You get a nice, tight-"

"Shut up the both of ya," D'Arcangelis said. "Get the case."

There were sounds of shuffling. Some mumbling. And then, "What d'ya mean you can't find it?!"

There was a sharp crack and either Goon One or Goon Two grunted, obviously having just suffered a blow from their irate boss. And then the Bear began to roar and Callen decided it really was time to make their way back to the hotel room.

* * *

**A/N: Poor kissed-silly Nell. Where's the mysterious brief case? And what are our agents going to do next?**


	17. Part 6, Chapter 1

**Author's Note: I think maybe I need to stop writing Nell/Callen fics because now whenever I watch the new episode (or old ones) of NCIS:LA, I sort of want Callen and Nell just to randomly make-out. (I'm so bored with Eric's huge, awkward crush on her… although it's gotten better now that she's playing it down again. Really didn't like it when they had Nell all awkwardly returning the sappy feelings. It's just so cliché and she's far more interesting a character than that.)**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 6: The Missing Agent**

**Chapter 1: In which Nell cools down by warming up…**

And she had thought that she'd looked as if she'd been up to something naughty after sleeping off her unsolicited intoxication. No. This, _this_ was what a freshly ravished Nell Jones would look like. Only probably a lot less tense...

She bit her lip so as not to gasp as she studied her appearance in the mirror of her hotel room en suite. Her hair may not have been displaying bed head as it had earlier, but it was markedly ruffled (from when Callen had his fingers tangled in it, guiding the angle of her head for better access to her mouth). Her dress was definitely rumpled now. And she lamented her choice in garment yet again, for her unrestrained breasts displayed visibly aroused nipples through the thin fabric despite the lining. But worst of all was her exposed skin, however.. Her face was still hot and flushed. Her lips were still pink despite the fact that her lipstick had been kissed away. They were also slightly swollen and shimmered with moisture. And her neck! It was red where Callen's perpetual five o'clock shadow had rubbed against the sensitive flesh. One would think it unpleasant, but she had quite enjoyed the feel of his stubble against her tingling skin. Followed by the feel of his contrastingly soft lips. Then the sharp bite of his teeth nipping at her. The warm, wet touch of his tongue...

_Stop it, Nell!_

She tried to think of something unpleasant to associate with the experience. The lack of control while he kissed her into a stupor. She should certainly have disliked that. Except, she had felt perfectly safe in his arms.

_C'mon, Nell. You can do this._

Only she couldn't think of anything she disliked about 'pretending' to make out with her fellow agent. But that didn't matter because it hadn't been real, anyway. And there was no need to dissuade herself from letting -_wanting_- something like that to happen again. Because it just wasn't going to. They were both profession-_AH!_

It couldn't be!

Nell leaned in closer to the mirror.

It was!

That bastard!

Delicately running a finger over her skin, she examined the red spot that was beginning to turn a little purple. For god's sake! He'd given her a hickey. Like they were randy teenagers. How hadn't she noticed? Oh, well... she knew how she had failed to notice. She'd been too distracted by the dizziness in her head. And the heat and solidity of his body pressed against hers. And his hands on her, holding, caressing, squeezing, massaging...

_Dear Lord, stop it!_

A shower. A cold shower. That's what was called for. Only... that worked for men all right but she always found unpleasantly cold water to give her hard nipples and tingling skin, which wasn't all that different than her current state. No, she wanted a warm shower, so hot that it was a soporific to her overly stimulated self. She wanted to feel so warm and content as to fall asleep on her feet. If her mind was drowsy, it couldn't consider how it had felt to have Callen's hands on her body. She wouldn't be able to replay that scene of heavy petting, or the further make-out session that happened in the back stairwell. Because it hadn't just ended after they left the mobsters squabbling in the coat check. Callen had wisely (or unwisely, as Nell was beginning to believe) maintained their cover as he led her the long way around the hotel back to her room, stopping to 'make sure no one was following them.' Which, had seemed to Nell just like a whole lot of tongue kissing on the landing of an empty stairwell.

Oh, god. She'd never been kissed like that before. And if that was just pretend for the man, what would it be like if he really meant it?

Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!

Nell shimmied out of her dress, and then carefully unclasped her garters, rolling her nylons off her legs and tossing them aside. The pink lace garter belt and matching panties quickly followed. Turning the hot water on as far as it would go, she watched with more than a little anticipatory pleasure as steam instantly rose off the porcelain tub and filled the space. She tested the water, knowing it would be too hot and quickly pulled her fingers back as not to be scalded. She sighed relenting to adjust the stream to be slightly cooler. She happily hopped into the shower, feeling the tension ease out of her under the lovely flow. Maybe she could purge the inappropriate feelings and memories of Callen's touch from her flesh with the hot water. As long as she didn't consider scenarios such as the possibility he might come into the bathroom for some reason... whilst she was naked in the shower... and decide to join her...

Nell scrubbed her scalp more vigorously than the cleanliness of her hair required. She shouldn't have decided to take a shower in the middle of an operation. _Dumb, Nell_. She tried to allow herself that she hadn't been thinking clearly. Feeling overwhelmed, her heart beating at hummingbird speeds, she had bolted for the bathroom and the door she could put between Callen and herself as soon as they'd entered the hotel room.

Which was quite rude and unprofessional, now that she could consider things besides that yearning tension that had been stirred deep inside her. Finally being (mostly) free of the urge to jump a certain blue-eyed federal agent's bones, Nell hastened through the rest of her ablutions so she could actually do her job and render Callen some assistance. After shutting the water off and wrapping herself in a towel as fluffy as a cloud, she looked about the small bathroom and cursed aloud. The decision to shower had been a snap one, and her change of clothes was in her bag in the other room. Double-checking that her cozy cloud towel was securely wrapped about her, Nell cracked the bathroom door and peeked out. She didn't see him...

"Callen?"

There was no response. Which was odd. Where would he have gone? And without telling her? His style was often to be a lone wolf, to go off and deal with situations on his own, but he'd been oddly protective of her so far this day to have just left her alone and vulnerable in the shower where she couldn't hear had anyone with ill intent approached her.

She eased the door the rest of the way open and padded out into the larger space. No sign of Callen anywhere. And he couldn't possibly be blending into the excessive vine motif background and hiding in plain sight. Her clutch was sitting on the table and Nell retrieved her cell phone from its limited depths to call the absent agent when there was a knock on the door.

That was probably him. He had had to step out for a minute. Maybe he'd tried to call Hetty and the cell phone service was poor. Or something. And now he was knocking to be polite because she'd been in the shower when he'd left. There was no peep hole for her to check that it was indeed Callen, so she slid the chain and then cracked the door.

It wasn't Callen.

* * *

**A/N: Who's at the door…? Where did Callen go…? Stay tuned (because now we're cooking)!  
**


	18. Part 6, Chapter 2

**Author's Note: The dialogue may have possibly gotten away from me here… And Callen perhaps is a bit too aggressive (but I sort of like him that way.)  
**

**Enjoy?**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 6: The Missing Agent**

**Chapter 2: In which Callen tries to clear his head, bruises a knuckle and discovers the usefulness of three-story drops...**

God help him, he was more than just a little bit turned on.

Callen paced about the smallish hotel room, then forced himself to stand still when he realized the movement only continued to keep his heart beating at an elevated rate. There just might be more adrenaline pumping through his system than he experienced when chasing down suspects or exchanging bullets with bad guys. And all because of one little intelligence analyst. An intelligence analyst with soft skin and the most kissable lips. And a body that seemed to be made for him to hold.

Closing his eyes and taking deep breaths, Callen focused on calming his nerves, slowing his heart, attempting to clear his head. Coming down was always the worst part of adrenaline soaked undercover stints. He tried to let go of the adamant need to possess the young woman who had fled into the bathroom directly after their returning to the room. _That_ was not his desire. It was his alias'.

_Are you sure?_

Callen shook off the thought with a roll of his shoulders. It hadn't exactly been difficult, kissing Nell and running his hands along her naked thigh, grasping the curve of her waist, tangling his fingers in her hair. He hadn't had to force his attraction whatsoever. But it wasn't real. Well, it was real, as was evidenced by the lingering lust he felt clinging to his conscious thoughts (and other places). But that didn't belong to him.

It wasn't him.

And it wasn't her.

She had run and hid from him as soon as she could. And now he could hear the shower running. That's what Nell Jones thought of his touch, his kiss. She was washing away every minute trace he'd left on her body. And rightly so. They needed to return to 'federal agent' mode. Once he finished getting his head on straight, he would contact Hetty and let her know they'd confirmed D'Arcangelis's presence, and that it was likely he was up to something insidious. Then they needed to locate that briefcase.

There was a knock on the hotel room door.

Who the hell could that be?

Callen had to remind himself that this was the wedding of one of Nell's friends. The young woman very well knew more than a few people here. And she'd been absent from the main festivities for awhile, long enough maybe someone had come to check on her. But he didn't like the idea that she could be so easily located. And _that_ was the paranoid secret agent in him talking. Nell could have easily given a friend her room number. She was a trusting, loyal, kind girl. And sociable. Unlike certain loner agents.

He pulled the SIG from the holster nestled at the small of his back, but held it out of sight at his side as he cracked the door. A man, slightly taller than Callen, with dark hair and green eyes, stood on the other side of the door. He wore a somewhat shocked expression on his face when Callen opened the door wider, having determined the man to be unarmed and posing no immediate threat (and quickly holstering his weapon).

"I think I've got the wrong room," the man said. "I was looking for Nell Jones."

Callen instinctually did not like this man. There was something about him that just begged for a punch in the face. And so he couldn't resist telling the precise truth.

"She's in the shower, getting cleaned up."

Something flashed in the man's green eyes, making their color seem oddly appropriate. Callen was beginning to have certain suspicions about this guy's identity.

"Can I give her a message?" Callen asked.

"Tell her Jack stopped by to check on her," he said. So, that's who this pretty boy was. But best to be sure.

"Jack? Jack Worthington?" Callen asked, stepping out into the hall, and closing the door behind him. Nell didn't need to hear this.

"Yes," Jack said uncertainly.

Callen punched him in the face.

And then he immediately remembered why he did not especially like punching people in the face, even arrogant bastards who deserved it. Faces were bony. Hard and sharp. He probably bruised his knuckle on the bridge of Mr. Jack Worthington's nose. But at least there'd been a satisfying crunching noise.

Worthington staggered back, clutching his lightly bleeding nose.

There had been more reason to striking the man in the face than the pure fun of it. It was painful and disorienting, and allowed Callen to grab the asshole by the arm and... '_escort_' him down the vacant hall into the back stairwell for a private... '_conversation.'_

"What the hell?!" Jack said when, after Callen had checked to make sure the stairwell was empty, the agent slammed his prisoner against the wall with a 'thud' that echoed through the enclosed space. Callen could feel the man's chest heaving for air beneath the arm he held there like an iron bar preventing Worthington from doing anything but look down into Callen's furious face.

And as it had been with kissing Nell earlier, Callen found that it was not difficult at all to call up the anger he directed at the younger man. The fear was still dominant in Jack Worthington's expression and body language, but it had seemed to subside slightly as Callen's hostility was reflected back to him.

"You punched me in the face," he said. Wuss. His nose had even stopped bleeding already.

"You drugged Nell," Callen said, as if it entirely justified his actions. To Callen, it certainly did.

"What?"

"You slipped something into her drink, gave it awhile to take effect and then decided to show up and see if she was more receptive to your interest."

Jack Worthington seemed genuinely bewildered, but Callen pressed him harder (physically and verbally).

"She refused you, so you... what? You thought you'd try a little trick from your frat days? Date rape is a crime, you sick piece of trash. But I think we'll leave the authorities out of it this time."

Taking two fistfuls of the man's shirt, Callen pulled Worthington over to the low, rather weak-looking (now that he considered it) metal railing at the edge of the stair landing. He could see the cement bottom three twisting flights of stairs down. That should be sufficiently terrifying. And if he _had_ to actually drop the man...

With a firm grasp, Callen pushed Jack Worthington against the railing until he knew the taller man's center of gravity had been upset, creating the disorienting feeling of falling for the bastard without any actual motion occurring. He grabbed for Callen's arms, so the agent let go with one hand and batted the scrabbling hands away.

"Stop struggling," Callen said, letting ice replace the heat of anger that had previously tinted his voice. "I don't want to drop you..." He let a thoughtful beat fall. "_by accident_."

Worthington stopped flailing, but was still making a sort of whine of protest and fear in the back of his throat. His green eyes were large and he was breathing heavily. Good. Fear had a way of taking over most bodily and brain functions. It was difficult to lie when suffering debilitating terror.

"Now tell me what happened," Callen said.

"Nothing, I swear!" Callen let the man's weight pull him a little further over the edge of the railing. He judged the angle to be about 40 degrees from upright. Nothing too substantial, but he wasn't the one with his back to a three story drop ending with concrete finality. Worthington's eyes darted wildly about. Maybe he was looking for something to find purchase on if Callen did toss him over the edge. No. The man was most apparently beyond rational thought. It was that frantic search people performed when they were facing imminent death, looking desperately for something to save them. Very good. Callen had him just where he wanted him. But he still wasn't spilling. Maybe he needed to be more precise to get through the thick skull on this man.

"Nothing may have happened, but what were you _planning_ to do?"

"Nothing! I wasn't-"

Callen released both hands, letting Worthington's weight carry him over the railing. With his waist acting as the fulcrum over the metal rail, the man's legs flew up and Callen caught them, holding the man nearly at 180 degrees from upright. A strangled scream issued from the back of Jack's throat.

"I've got something to tell you." Now Callen let his voice turn casual, conversational. In his experience, it was when the calm ones threatened you that you really took notice. "Are you listening, Jack?"

"Yes. Yes!" Desperate. Desperate and afraid. If he could still lie at this point, Callen had to admit the man was more wily and clever than he'd given him credit for.

"Good. Because I have good and bad news for you." He leaned over to look the dangling man in the reddening face. He was going to have one hell of a headache if Callen let him back up, with all that blood flowing straight to his head. Then again, if Callen didn't haul him back up, he was going to have one killer headache, as well. (For about a half a second). "Which would you like first?"

Worthington didn't respond.

"Oh, you don't care? Let's start with some good news, then. Did you know I used to be able to bench press my own weight?

"No? Well, I could. And fairly easily, too. And by my estimate, I've got what? At least 25 pounds on you. So hauling your ass back up here should be a piece of cake, right? Except...

"Well, that brings me to the bad news. I'm not as young as I used to be. And that particular skill is a few years behind me now. And the longer I have to stand here and keep your pathetic ass from doing an Olympic-worthy swan dive to the cement below, the more tired I get."

Callen paused, but Worthington seemed to have finally decided to shut his mouth.

"So why don't we cut the bullshit. And you tell me what you were up to today so that I can pull you back up before I drop you on your thick head?"

No response.

Jerk.

"Well?" Callen shook the legs he had a firm (yet quickly weakening) grasp upon. Jack cried out for him to stop.

"Okay! Okay. Just who the fuck are you anyway? Nell's boyfriend or something?"

"Or something."

With some effort he hauled the taller man back over the metal rail, and they both ended up breathing heavily, slumped on the floor. But before Jack Worthington could decide to make a run for it, or get some payback on Callen, the agent pulled out his SIG and pointed it casually in the younger man's direction.

"Whoa! What the hell?" Jack put out his hands in a placating 'please don't shoot me' gesture.

"Talk."

"God's honest truth. I don't know what you're talking about... drugging Nell. I-I hit on her, yes. She turned me down. I thought maybe if she had more to drink..."

Callen scoffed, disgusted. He never understood men chasing after women who were by no means interested, as if they weren't capable of knowing their own minds. And then there were men who took advantage of women in compromised states... Yet he was beginning to believe that maybe Jack Worthington hadn't slipped something into Nell's drink. Still, the man was a first-rate asshole.

"Can you give me a good reason not to shoot you and put you out of the misery of women everywhere?"

"Just who the hell do you think you are?" Jack Worthington apparently had already forgotten about being dangled over a three-story drop. It was the _airs. _That sense of entitlement and privilege that wafted off the man like liberally applied designer cologne. That arrogance is what had set Callen off initially. "I'll have you destroyed. You know who I am. You know I can-"

"Shut up!" Callen's brain was trying to tell him something. But what? Worthington was still attempting to threaten him, becoming more brazen as he went. It was something important. Something urgent. He could feel it in his gut. If the annoying rich brat would just shut his mouth for half a second.

"I asked you to be quiet," Callen said.

"You can't talk to me like this. You can't threaten me like this. I'm going to have you arrested. I'm-"

Callen struck him in the side of the head with the butt of his SIG. The man collapsed entirely to the floor in an unconscious state, leaving Callen able to concentrate on what his instincts were trying to tell him. He closed his eyes for just a moment and cocked his head, listening. Because he had heard something. There was nothing but silence now. But his ears had definitely picked up something that his brain had logged away while his focus was upon the annoying bastard (presently lying drooling on the floor). What was it?

A scream.

A woman's scream.

_Nell!_

* * *

**A/N: buh… buh… BUH! ;-)**


	19. Part 6, Chapter 3

**Author's Note: If you didn't like the suspense of the last chapter… you probably are going to hate me up until this little tale is concluded. ;-)**

**Warning: Some cursing.**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 6: The Missing Agent**

**Chapter 3: In which Nell has unexpected guests, tries to call for help, and resorts to unconventional weapons…**

It was _not_ Callen.

Nell hastily shut the door, hearing the electronic lock engage with a 'click', which did not give her much relief. Perhaps, she could have played it cool, tried to feign ignorance. But it was definitely no mere coincidence D'Arcangelis' two goons were just outside her hotel room door.

Her Glock.

She hurried over to her pile of luggage and began to search through it as the knocking on the door became a pounding. It wasn't there. She would've known if the panic hadn't overtaken her higher brain functions and sent her scrambling for a weapon she hadn't packed. She could practically hear Sam Hanna's voice scolding her. Field agents never went anywhere without their service weapon, whether or not they were on or off duty. They never stopped being agents. Never. But Nell did.

And it was going to cost her, wasn't it?

Okay... windows. Permanently shut. Ugh! She hated air conditioning. There was a thud as a dense shoulder hit the door.

Shit!

Nell ran into the bathroom, closing and locking the door behind her. Probably futile, but at least there was one more barrier to buy her time. Fight. She was going to have to fight. She tossed the towel aside. Worrying about it falling off or tangling her up wasn't what she needed. Her dress was a pink, wrinkled clump of fabric on the floor. She picked it up, quickly pulled it on. The knit fabric clung to her still damp skin, which in this case was a good thing. There wouldn't be any excess fabric getting in her way.

Weapon... Weapon... She needed a weapon...

She surveyed the small room for anything remotely useful. The towel bar. She pulled the hand towel off and grasped the metal bar, pulling with as much muscle as she had, first putting downward pressure and then lifting, trying to work the screws out of the sheetrock. It wiggled almost imperceptibly. She didn't have time for this. She needed a lever to pop it out in little time. She glanced around, looking for something she could use to pry the bar out of the wall, only to realize if she had something that would serve to lever the rod out, she would already have a weapon.

She abandoned the futile choice of armament.

There was loud crack, something that sounded like a doorframe splintering around an engaged lock. She was running out of time. And fast.

Something heavy or blunt. Or something that could be swung with force. Or anything not nailed down. A mini bottle of complimentary shampoo? Useless. Bar of soap? Wet towel? Perhaps good for locker room hijinks, but hardly a deterrent to two burly mob guys.

She heard loud, gruff voices.

"Where's the little bitch?"

"Bathroom. Do ya see it?"

"Nope."

There was the sound of furniture being carelessly tossed around. They were ransacking the room. Looking for something. _For that damned briefcase? _

"Anythin'?"

"Not a fuckin' thing."

"Let's get the bitch."

Oh shit. Nell backed away from the door as the handle jiggled, panic threatening to immobilize her. She fought it down.

"C'mon, sweet thing," one of the goons said from the other side of the door in what he must have thought to be a coaxing tone. "We just wants to ask ya a couple questions. Nuffin' more."

Nell looked frantically about the still steam-filled bathroom. There, on the edge of the counter where she had set it down in her desperate search for a instrument of defense. The best weapon she could possibly have of all. Stupid. Why didn't she think of it earlier?!

Her phone. She scooped it up, found the entry for Callen's number and pressed send. Even had he switched his cell phone out for one 'belonging' to his alias, that phone would've been logged into the system. And Nell herself had written the program that forwarded calls to any of the phones logged under any agent's name to their currently online one. A neat piece of code, if she said so herself. So if Callen had his phone on him, there was no way he wouldn't know she was calling.

The doorknob rattled more fervently. And the entire door shuddered with a 'thump' as D'Arcangelis' goons began to break down the bathroom door as they'd doubtless done to the outer one. Damn. Without pockets, underwear or a bra, Nell had no place to stow the phone that was still valiantly trying to reach help for its owner. Callen wasn't picking up. But he still might. She couldn't afford to disconnect and toss the phone aside.

The possibility of calling in back-up was far more valuable to her than the use of her left hand in a fight, so she kept the phone clutched tightly in her hand.

And then as the door thumped another time, she remembered when the flushing mechanism broke in the toilet of her apartment and while fiddling with inner workings, she'd inadvertently dropped the tank cover on her toe, nearly fracturing the bone. She picked up the porcelain slab off the back of the toilet. It was heavy. If she wasn't careful, she might break her wrist. But it would be worth avoiding whatever these horrible brutes wanted from her.

She positioned herself just outside the range of the door, knowing in very short time they would kick it open with terrible force. Two hands would be much better than one to swing her improvised weapon. But she couldn't let go of the phone. It was still ringing, since apparently there was no voicemail set up yet.

_Where are you, Callen?_

_Oh suck it up, Nell Jones. _She could take care of herself, goddammit!

The door burst open, sending several splinters of wood flying through the air and Nell's heart leaping up into her throat. The first goon came rushing into the bathroom a split second later and Nell swung the ceramic slab up, gaining force until it struck the big thug in the jaw with a sound like a side of beef hitting pavement. Nell felt the impact jar her to the bone, and she dropped the make-shift weapon without conscious thought. It must have cracked from the collision with the thug's jaw for it split in two upon hitting the tile floor. The big man himself staggered back several feet and Nell took the opportunity to kick him soundly in the groin, and then when he fell to his knees followed it with another kick to the side of the head. The thug who was easily twice her size crumpled into a large, keening heap on the floor at her feet.

That training with Sam Hanna was definitely paying off.

Nell jumped over the shuddering mass and made to bolt for the door, knowing speed was her only chance at escaping the second goon now that she'd exhausted the element of surprise.

Unfortunately his comrade's outcries had alerted Goon Number 2, and Nell found herself grabbed roughly from behind in a painfully tight bear hug. Her arms pinned to her side, she struck out with her feet, trying to drive her heals into any soft bit she could find. She struck nothing but hard muscle and didn't have the leverage to put any real force behind her kicks. Even though the call had doubtlessly timed out, Nell still held her cell phone in a death grip. What else could she do? _What else?_

A conversation with Sam returned to Nell. She'd been frustrated by the realization that no matter how much she practiced, how good she got, she would never be able to fend off someone of Sam Hanna's size and conditioning. Or Callen's. Or Deeks'. Or Kensi's... It was especially disheartening because not only had Sam specifically told her this truth in that no nonsense way of his, but he'd instructed her to scream for help if she were ever assaulted. She had thought it was because he thought her pathetic and weak. But that had not been it at all. He had explained it like this, "Nell. You_ are _strong. And tough. Anyone one who knows you can see it. But part of acquiring fighting skills is knowing yourself, your strengths and weaknesses. Accepting your abilities. Accepting who you are and using that to your advantage. Just as I would use my height and weight against an opponent, you can and _should_ use you physical attributes. You're small and fast, Nell. And that's good in a fight. But you're also a woman. Petite and pretty. And before you protest about it being the 21st century, and men and women being equals in all things, just think about it. That's the ideal. Fact is, if you're in trouble, if you call out for help, you're more likely to get that aid." He chuckled briefly. "I wish I had that on my side. People will go out of their way to avoid interfering in a fight between two large men." He'd sobered up a bit again, looked Nell directly in the eyes with his warm, chocolate ones. "If you get into a situation where you're fighting for your life, Nell, promise me you'll use every advantage you've got."

She had promised.

So Nell opened her mouth and screamed at the top of her lungs (well, as loudly as her lung capacity would allow as her chest was being compressed in the tight hold Goon Number 2 had on her).

A hand the size of her head promptly clamped down over her mouth and nose. This effectively cut off her scream. It also cut off her air supply. She began to squirm as her lungs burned and her vision blurred, clawing at the thick arm, wrist and hand that was cutting off her oxygen. Oh, fuck! she was going to pass out! She couldn't fight back if she was unconscious. Or dead. No. They'd wanted to ask her questions. They hadn't wanted her dead. But still... But... but...

Nell Jones blacked out.

* * *

**A/N: Now we know what was happening with Nell while Callen was off avenging the threat to Nell's virtue. But what's going to happen next…? :-) **


	20. Part 6, Chapter 4

**Author's Note: I can see the end to this little adventure approaching… can you? ;-)**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 6: The Missing Agent**

**Chapter 4: In which Callen arrives too late to the scene, has to confess his failure, and makes a plan of action…**

Callen hesitated. And hated himself for it. When in the latter part of his career had he ever hesitated?! Never. His instincts never seemed to fail him, not in the last ten years or so, anyway. Something was certainly throwing him off his game today. But he didn't exactly want to examine the cause in detail.

He pulled a plastic zip-tie from his pocket and secured one of the unconscious Jack Worthington's wrists to the metal railing. Callen might actually be willing to believe the man hadn't intentionally drugged Nell to have his way with her, but there was something up with the spoiled heir. He'd come back for him.

But first Nell needed him.

If it was indeed Nell who had screamed.

_You know it was._

He ran down the still vacant hallway, slowing as he approached Nell Jones' hotel room, and putting his back to the wall. The door was closed, but he could tell the latch was broken. Giving it a push, he waited a beat for any response from within, and when there was none, swung around to enter the room, SIG drawn before him. The room was a mess, but otherwise empty. He likewise confirmed the bathroom was clear before running back out into the hall. Even a cursory glance had informed him that there'd been a struggle within the trashed space, which in combination with the single scream he'd heard, had a hard knot forming in the pit of his stomach.

Someone had taken Nell.

It was really the only conclusion.

_Think, Callen. Think._

There were no mechanisms for opening the windows, which he knew from trying to let some fresh air in for the intoxicated and unconscious Nell a few hours earlier. And they weren't broken. So they hadn't taken her out that way. No one, not even the two oafs working for D'Arcangelis (who, at this point was Callen's primary suspect) would be stupid enough to carry a kidnapped woman down the main staircase and out the front door. And they hadn't come through the stairwell where Callen had been busy interrogating Worthington. If he remembered correctly, that only left a stairwell on the opposite side of the third floor as means of egress. Callen ran down the empty halls, both grateful everyone in the hotel was busy partying it up elsewhere (and not getting in his way) and cursing the fact that no one had been around to come to Nell' aide.

Well, her safety had been _his_ responsibility. And he failed her.

No. Not yet. He'd get her back. He'd make sure she was safe and unharmed, or else...

He swallowed down the thought as he burst into the stairwell. No one in sight. He leaned over the railing but didn't seen anyone on the twisting flights of stairs. Closing his eyes, he tried to separate out the pounding of his blood in his ears and focus. There were no voices. No footsteps. No one in the stairwell.

How long had it been since he'd heard her scream? Not long. But acts of violence never did take very much time to happen, despite feeling like an eternity when you were in the midst of them. The question was, had it been enough time for whoever had assaulted Nell to take her out of the hotel? Or had they simply holed up in another one of the rooms?

Reacting as quickly as possible to the event hadn't bore fruit. He had to go back to the evidence.

Callen made his way back to the now empty room, more slowly, trying to detect any sign left by Nell or her abductors along the way. A sharp chirping echoed through the vacant hallway, causing him to jump at the interruption to his thoughts. After a moment, he realized it was coming from the cell phone in his pocket. He pulled it out and his heart fell as he read '1 Missed Call' and discovered it had come from Nell's cell phone less than ten minutes ago. There hadn't been service in the stairwell, when he'd been too busy playing to his ego and bullying her ex-boyfriend and she had called for help. She had called _him_ for help.

Callen shut down the train of thought that would take him nowhere helpful. Instead, he brought up the number for ops and called in, wondering whose reaction he dreaded more, Hetty's... or Eric's...

Eric picked up.

/We're still combing through the guest list, Callen. But no red flags yet. I promise we'll contact you as soon-/

"Eric." Callen cut off the young man's slightly irritated tirade. "They've taken Nell."

/What?! Who?! How'd this happen? I thought you were keeping an eye on her!/

The guilt was a sharp little pang beneath Callen's ribs, but he resisted the urge to wallow in self-reproach. He likewise ignored Eric's panicked (but rightly deserved) accusations of negligence.

"I need you to check any of the hotel's surveillance footage you can access remotely and find Nell. She would have been taken from her room about ten minutes ago."

There was no verbal response from Eric, but Callen assumed the tech was already executing his order before he'd finished giving it. Hetty's voice came on the line.

/What happened, Mr. Callen?/ The older woman sounded as calm as ever, but he knew the reserve belied an anxious interior, for he felt precisely the same.

"It looks like they broke the door down, but she had locked herself in the bathroom by then."

He walked into the en suite, surveying the damage. There was a wet towel in a heap on the floor. Nearby, there was a little pile of pantyhose and pink lace. Why his mind chose to dwell on that, Callen didn't want to know, and he could only but shake off the recollection of rough lace against smooth skin that tingled in his fingers. Her dress was missing. Along with the presence of the towel, its absence led him to believe she had at least been out of the shower when her abductor came for her (which was not much relief). A smaller towel had been flung onto the counter, and Callen could see where the screws holding the brass rod to the wall had been loosed. Nell had been looking for a weapon. And then he saw the two halves of the toilet tank cover lying on the tile nearby a small pool of blood. _Good Girl_.

He walked back out into the hotel room. The chairs had been turned over. The covers ripped off the bed and the mattress askew as if it had been lifted and then tossed haphazardly back down. Nell's small suitcase had been gutted, its contents strewn across the floor. Her satchel had been given the same treatment.

"It looks like they tore apart the room, searching for something before they went for Nell," he said. "And I think I know what they're after..."

/And that would be, Mr. Callen?/ Hetty asked.

"A briefcase. Nell remembered-"

/I can't find her anywhere!/ Eric's voice was high and panicked. And followed with a foul word Callen had never before heard the likes of from the young man.

/Keep searching, Mr. Beale. I have every confidence you will be able to track Miss Jones down./

God bless Hetty for reassuring the young man. But Callen knew, and he also knew Hetty was likewise aware, that the security cameras might be limited. Or they might not have removed Nell from the premises. In short, there may be nothing Eric could do to locate his partner. Callen was her best chance. But it seemed he needed to figure out what these mobsters were up to, what they wanted, before he could help Nell. If they'd hurt her at all...

/The briefcase, Mr. Callen./

"I'm sorry, Hetty. What about the briefcase?" He'd zoned out thinking about what he'd do when he found the men who'd taken Nell, about what he'd do to them, about what he wanted to do to her…gather her up in his arms and... What?! No. That wasn't his thought. That was just a lingering remnant of letting his Alpha Male out to play and scare the bejesus out of Worthington.

/What is its contents? And what precisely did Miss Jones recall about the item?/

"Oh. Um..." _Focus, G. _"We don't know what's in the briefcase. It wasn't there when we went back to the coat check. But Nell clearly remembered noticing it there earlier, after D'Arcangelis and his men had entered and then left the room, because it wasn't there prior to their appearance. They came back for it while we were searching the room."

/And so they followed you back to the hotel room and abducted Miss Jones when they couldn't locate it./

Ouch.

"I was careful, Hetty." Callen tried to keep the anger, most of which was directed at himself, out of his tone. "We weren't followed."

A thought struck Callen. It wasn't fully formed, but it had his instincts screaming to be heard. Worthington. He had something to do with this. Whether his dear mobster cousin D'Arcangelis recruited him as a distraction, or the thugs had simply seen the man with Nell earlier and followed him straight to her, Jack Worthington was most definitely involved.

/Mr. Callen?/ Hetty apparently could hear the gears turning in his head over the phone.

"I think I need to have another little chat with Jack Worthington," he said. "Keep Eric on the surveillance footage. And see if he can track Nell's phone. I think she had it on her when she was abducted. Kensi and Deeks should continue combing through the guest list. Whatever's going on, they key is in there. Oh, and call in Sam for me. I'd appreciate his help."

/Consider it done,/ Hetty said. /Please find Miss Jones. And you have my permission to do whatever you deem necessary to recover her safely./

"Thanks, Hetty. I _will._"

* * *

**A/N: Sorry, not so much action-y fun, but Callen needs to know whose ass to kick and where to find them, now doesn't he? **

**But what's going on with poor, abducted Nell… (stay tuned…)**


	21. Part 7, Chapter 1

**Author's Note: Enjoy…?**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Part 7: The Turning Point**

**Chapter 1: In which Nell becomes undesirably familiar with a wooden chair, cheroots, and a sociopath…**

"Who or what is 'Callen'?"

Nell blinked to clear her eyes of the tears, sending them flowing down her cheeks and stinging her skin. Focusing on the face of her 'interrogator', she tried to figure out the meaning behind the words he'd just spoken. The intricate web of nerves just beneath the skin of her inner thigh were still screaming.

"Wh-what?" Her breathing was in overdrive, trying to compensate for the air being forced out of her by the blinding pain.

"You cried out for someone or something called 'Callen'," the dark man said. His voice was the deadly calm of a sociopath, rendered all the more terrifying by the slightly accented yet smooth British speech pattern.

"I-I don't know wh-what your talking about, " Nell said.

The sociopath took a long, slow drag on his cheroot. Rather than closing with enjoyment of the toxic vapor, the eerie pale green-grey eyes bored into Nell the entire time. She bit the inside of her cheek against the whimpering burbling up in her throat and met the bastard's gaze with as much steel as her trembling self could muster.

When he removed the cigarette from his lips and exhaled slowly, his eyes played over the entirety of her body where it sat strapped to the wooden chair. There were no arms on this particular shaker style piece of furniture, so her arms had been bound at the wrist to the spindles at her lower back and she could feel the rough grain of wood against her bare skin. Being as petite as she was, this position also had the unfortunate side affect of forcing her to contort to the shape of the chair so as not to further wrench her shoulder. In doing so, her back was obliged to arch, displaying more prominently to the world what wares she had. The writhing around in agony against her taut bonds had -of course- shifted the fabric of her stupid goddamn dress to expose her right breast. Under any other circumstances, Nell would've been absolutely mortified by shame over such an occurrence. But at the moment, she was too filled with loathing, pain and fear to be concerned.

The sociopath leaned in, and Nell's knee spasmed reflexively. Had her ankles not been secured rather well to the chair legs, she would have just kicked the bastard square in the balls. But her ankles _were _tied quite securely to the chair legs.

Mr. Sociopath took another drag on his cheroot, blowing smoke straight in her face as he reached out towards her exposed breast. Nell turned her face away, as much because she didn't want to see him touch her (feeling it would be bad enough, but unavoidable given her present circumstances) as she found the toxic smoke choking and needed to cough. She squeezed her eyes shut, anticipating being groped and tried to focus on something else, like the burning sensation on her inner thigh. But those powerful, long fingers did not caress or grab the supple flesh of her round, pert breast. Rather, they brushed against her exposed nipple inadvertently as they tugged her dress back into place.

"American whore," Mr. Sociopath said softly. It was a phrase common to fanatical middle eastern extremists, but Mr. Sociopath uttered it with a hint of affection in his otherwise unrevealing tone. She looked at him, but there was no change in his expression. It was the same superior, bored look. It said, 'This is business to me and the sooner it's done, the better.'

He tapped the ash off the end of the cheroot, and then took another short puff. The end glowed red hot and panic struck Nell like a bolt of lightening at the sight of it. Or, more accurately, like a bolt of shear agony caused by the glowing end of a cheroot being applied to the vulnerable flesh of her inner right thigh.

Nell wasn't proud enough to deny (even to herself) that she screamed. It was an instinctual, inevitable reaction to being in pain. And she wasn't about to bite through her lip in a vain attempt to stifle the outcry. She couldn't say precisely why, but when the instrument of her torture was removed from its grisly task and returned to the lips of the goddamn bastard who'd made it his mission to hurt her, Nell looked down at her lap. Up until this point, she couldn't stomach looking at the sickening sight, the results of being burned in such a manner. Great, angry blisters had formed on the tender flesh of her inner thigh, red circles with black charred centers. Not quite bleeding, but definitely oozing some bodily fluids that had boiled up to the surface. Mr. Sociopath had been rather methodically working his way up. Three so far, the first being located a few inches above her knee. Each progressive burn had been about an inch higher. Which meant there was a good amount of inner thigh remaining for the crazy asshole to apply his cheroot to. This was most apparently his interrogation method of choice, for he was expert at getting the cigarette just the right blazing temperature to sear flesh, and did not even flinch when applying it to her naked skin. Even as she thrashed against the pain (and her bindings), he was able to maintain a steady degree of pressure, destroying dermis and nerves alike down through several layers. The skin had bubbled, turned white, then black. Or maybe that was simply ash embedded in her thigh?

"There," Mr. Sociopath said, lighting a new cheroot after discarding the one that had spent its last fraction of an inch eating through Nell's flesh. "You did it once more. 'Callen. Callen, help me.' Who is this Callen? And does this person have my merchandise?"

So, she had cried out for Callen. Probably because he was the only one close enough to save her. Well, at least, Nell hoped they hadn't left the country club grounds and that Callen was tracking her down that very moment. Trying to not get her hopes up too high, Nell did note with some pleasure that they appeared to be in an out-of-use stable, smelling only vaguely of horse and their associated scents of hay, leather and manure. And thus they were likely still at the country club. She knew from the little map she'd studied while waiting to check in at reception that the stables were located on the far end, past the golf course and horse tracks, a couple of miles from the hotel. But shouldn't there be staff or groundskeepers about? Well, the hour _was_ late. And money could turn many a blind eye and plug many an ear (even to a woman's agonized screams).

"Earlier in the coat check, there was this guy with the little piece."

Nell had nearly forgotten the Chicago bear. What was his name? Anyway, she'd basically forgotten the mobster, being preoccupied by Mr. Sociopath's oh-so-excellent hospitality. Not that D'Arcangelis (oh, that was the name, hardly fitting though it was) was any less dangerous or cruel. She had the bruises on her arms (from where his goons -'associates'- grabbed her) and the swelling, throbbing place on her cheekbone (where he'd backhanded her when she refused to talk) to remind her.

"And why didn't you invite him to join our little soiree as well as the young lady?" Mr. Sociopath asked. For the first time, he showed something beyond the mildest emotion. A slight Middle-Eastern accent, maybe Saudi or Egyptian, slanted his words as he became agitated, which confirmed her team's assumption that D'Arcangelis was using the wedding as a cover to sell weapons or intelligence to terrorist groups. Although, Mr. Sociopath seemed more the middle man type, rather than one prone to fanaticism.

"The bitch was alone in her hotel room. There wasn't no sign of 'im."

"Idiot," Mr. Sociopath said.

"Probably she can tell us where he's at, though," D'Arcangelis said. "Or she mighten have taken the briefcase herself."

Mr. Sociopath seemed to fume for a moment before regaining his stoic facade.

"All right," he said, placing a genial hand upon D'Arcangelis' meaty shoulder. "It's all right. You are probably correct, my friend. The woman will tell us what we wish to know."

Mr. Sociopath returned his attention to Nell, and she involuntarily took a sharp breath in. She might scream, but she wasn't going to beg. Again the cheroot kissed her skin in a searing embrace that had her writhing against her bonds, throwing her head back and screaming. Maybe Callen wasn't close enough to hear her, but perhaps there was someone, anyone nearby, a person they'd bribed to let them into the stable, whose conscience could only be bought so far. Surely, the sound of a woman in such agony would at some point outweigh the roll of bills in their pocket?

The concentrated fire had been removed from her skin, but she was only vaguely aware after a few minutes, when the pounding of blood in her ears had subsided, that there was some sort of conference going on several yards away from her. She blinked the tears from her eyes, taking hissing inhalations of air in through gritted teeth as she fought the urge to moan pathetically. Her sight was still a little too blurry to see the details of the men, the thrumming in her ears still too loud to hear separate words in their conversation. But she had no need to strain her senses, for Mr. Sociopath was approaching her once more. And the mere sight of his smile turned her stomach into a lump of lead in her guts. She had the sudden panicky knowledge that he would do something far, far worse to her than burn her skin with his fragrant and still smoldering cheroot.

But When he held out the object in his hand for her to examine, she saw only... _her cell phone?!/_

Now she had to fight not grin even more impishly back at the idiot. If they had kept her cell phone, then Eric would've already tracked the GPS chip and Callen and any other amount of back up were already on their way to her. It would only be a matter minutes. But when she saw Mr. Sociopath hold up the battery in his other hand, her heart fell. She really needed to find a work around, install some sort of micro-battery to run the GPS chip in cases like this.

The (in another situation, she would've thought) attractive, dark haired, olive skinned, psychotic, terrorist-associated, middleman inserted the battery back in her phone and fiddled with it a moment, obviously perusing its memory. Smiling wickedly as he looked her in the eyes with his steely green-grey gaze, he tapped the screen of the little phone and held it to his ear.

"Is this Callen?"

Nell's heart skipped a beat, despite the fact that it could be no one else they'd call. They thought she was simply a guest at the wedding who had stumbled upon their deal. And Callen could only be her friend, boyfriend, lover... companion of some sort.

"You do not need to know my name. Only that I have Nell Jones.

"Why, I want me merchandise, of course. And don't pretend you don't know what I'm talking about."

So Callen was playing it dumb, giving her the benefit of the doubt, that she had continued to maintain cover.

"A briefcase. I will exchange the girl for it."

Mr. Sociopath looked irritated by whatever Callen was saying.

"Fine." He turned to Nell. "You will tell him where the briefcase is and nothing else."

The man didn't bother with a threat, for he knew that she already knew what he was capable of, and willing to do to retrieve his 'merchandise.' He held the phone up to her ear.

_Crap. _Nell chewed her lip momentarily. The horrible part was that she had actually remembered where the briefcase had gone, where she had moved it. And here she had held through the years to the belief that torture wasn't effective. Okay, well, it had somehow in all the firings of her neurons jogged her memory. But it hadn't provided that information for her interrogators, for she had resolutely adhered to the premise that she was just an ignorant young woman who'd done nothing to interfere with their business.

/Nell, are you okay?/ Callen asked.

"I'm fine. They want me to tell you where to find this... briefcase?"

There, that should be vague enough if he wanted her to continue to play ignorant. He didn't.

/Can they hear me?/

"No."

/Good. Can they hear you?/

"Yes."

Mr. Sociopath narrowed his eyes at Nell for the possibly off-topic conversation, but said nothing. The warning was clear. Get to it.

/Okay. If you can, I need you to give me some clue to find it. We'll swap out the contents and pretend to go through with the trade. Otherwise we'll wing it. But we'll get you out. I promise./

Callen's word had sent a wave of relief through him. But how could she tell him without giving too clear a location? If the bad guys could just go retrieve the item themselves, they had no use for her.

"Remember where you found me earlier today?"

/The ladies' room on the first floor, near the Lobby./

"Yes. Rosie's keeping it there for me."

She wasn't sure what part of her mind's ramblings he'd been privy to, but maybe he'd figure it out. And it might keep Mr. Sociopath occupied longer, searching her phone for someone called 'Rosie', enough time to trace the location.

But in the end, She discovered that would not be necessary. Mr. Sociopath told Callen exactly where to go, where they were, assuming he was just another run-of-the-mill rich, incapable American.

Oh, to see the look on the bastard's face when he eventually realized how sadly mistaken he'd been...

* * *

**A/N: Not sure if you've noticed this, but the more I love a character, the more likely I am to abuse them. Guess it sucks to be Nell and Callen in my fics (but nothing too horrible in this one, I don't think… it's meant to be somewhat lighter, at least.)**


	22. Part 7, Chapter 2

**Author's Note: Wowza! Really, really sorry about the delay. I knew it wouldn't be a problem to write one I set to it, but for some reason I had a hard time convincing myself to do so lately. Enjoy?**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Chapter 7: The Turning Point**

**Part 2: In which Callen reluctantly absolves Jack Worthington, and receives a phone call…**

"I swear all Marco wanted me to do was add his friend to the guest list," Jack Worthington said with a sort of desperate earnestness that had Callen reluctantly pitying the bastard.

"How come I find that hard to believe?" Sam Hanna asked, turning from one in a long line of paces about the small (and still trashed) hotel room, to pin his fierce gaze on their suspect. Oh, both agents knew by now that the man had nothing to do with the more nefarious side of his cousin's schemes, but the asshole deserved being put in his place more than a little bit. Besides, the 'nice' tactic wouldn't get him to spill any information that he might not know was important but could help them find Nell Jones. If he was at all at ease, the rich boy would revert back to his privileged attitude of superiority with the federal agents he deemed beneath him.

Although, Callen, too had to reluctantly admit Jack Worthington wasn't all that bad a guy. When they'd first explained the situation, that Nell had been abducted, he'd sincerely wanted to help them find her, do anything to make sure she was safe. And he couldn't fault the man for liking Nell Jones, for wanting to protect her. And if he had treated Nell with as much charm and tenderness as his affection for her seemed to hold, then Callen could finally see why Nell had ever associated with Worthington. Because the agent could not see Nell Jones, even a young (well, even _younger_) and naive Nell Jones dating such a jerk. She was smarter than that.

"I'm telling you, he just said that he really wanted to attend Trisha's wedding but he couldn't put off this business deal. You know, finicky clients and all that."

Sam snorted in mock disbelief, turning his back dramatically and taking another turn about the room. One could say these little dramatics were all for show, but they also gave Callen a chance to chime in any time without interrupting his partner and undermining the big man's intimidating authority. Good god, no one on this planet could intimidate like Sam Hanna. Callen thought he himself had cultivated a fairly decent menacing edge over the years, but Sam's physical presence was enough to make a grown man pee himself, let alone when the man turned on the appropriate hostile attitude. But the man could be a Teddy Bear as well. He was a good man. And the best friend a loner, broken agent could have.

"I'm going to ask you one more time, Mr. Worthington," Sam said. "Were you in on the deal?"

"I told you no! I just added this 'Hakim Kouri ' to the guest list."

Sam threw his hands up in the air in mock exaggeration. "I give up."

That meant it was Callen's turn. He was well aware of the time that had passed with no sign of Nell. Twenty or so minutes? Too much time. And yet, not enough to get the full picture. They needed to know the details of the events in order to track down those who'd taken Nell, to get her back safely. Worthington's story seemed clear enough. And Callen believed him. But what was left unexplained, what had drawn them into this little noir in the first place was bothering him. Why drug Nell? It implied a knowledge of her background, of her status as a federal agent (which Worthington did not appear privy to, since he had asked Callen if Nell was aware he was a federal agent as if it were a disease, to which Callen had simply replied 'Yes.'), a scheme to incapacitate or kidnap her. And the idea that causing her harm had been intentional rather than incidental made that knot of worry sit rock hard in his stomach. Unless...

"Did you see D'Arcangelis' business partner Mr. Kouri ?" Callen asked, feeling like a large puzzle piece had fallen in to place.

"Yes, actually," Jack said. Sam had stopped his feigned frustrated and put-out, angry bad cop routine to study the green-eyed man's face. "I ran into them before the ceremony."

"What happened, _exactly_?" Callen asked, leaning forward in his chair. For most of the interrogation, he had been playing the silent and menacing, scary-for-his-seeming-nonchalance cop.

"Umm..." Jack gave them a look as if this was the most ridiculous, irrelevant thing they could be asking him.

"I said 'Hello, Marco. Glad to see you could make it.'

"He was like, 'Wouldn't miss it for the world. How's your mom... blah blah...'

"And then I think I said, 'Oh this must be your friend, Mr. Kouri'"

Jack sat up suddenly straighter, perhaps he wasn't as stupid as Callen had initially thought and had caught on to the agent's train of thought.

"And then Marco gave me this look like I'd said something wrong. You know, one of his scary 'I know men that can make you sleep wit' the fishes' looks."

Callen nodded.

"Later," the agent said. "Where did you get the champagne from? A waiter? The bartender?"

"The bar," Worthington said.

"So they wouldn't know the drinks weren't for you, that they were for Nell," Callen concluded, somehow feeling relieved that no one had directly intended to drug Nell. Not that it got her back, goddammit.

"Are you saying what I think you're saying?" Jack asked, looking rather serious and intelligent, and definitely beginning to make Callen suspect the whole 'spoiled, dumb rich boy' routine to be an act, one acquired to satisfy the world's expectations.

"Your beloved cousin tried to drug you to get you out of the way while he made his deal with terrorists," Sam said.

Jack's green eyes went wide. "Terrorists?"

Callen shook his head. Okay, not so smart as all that.

"Yeah," Sam said. "D'Arcangelis has been selling weapons and state secrets to terrorist groups. And you just aided and embedded such a deal today. You'll be lucky we don't through your ass in Gitmo." Sam put his hands on the arms of the chair where the young man sat and leaned in, getting into Worthington's face. "And if there's a single hair out place on Nell Jones' head we still might do just that."

They would do no such thing. Callen suppressed a chuckle, thankful his back was turned to the scene as he made to dial ops on his cell phone. He really was in no mood to laugh, but Sam had a way of lightening his heart even during the darkest moments. Besides, they might not be able to carry through on such a threat. But there were other things they could do to Mr. Jack Worthington. Except, god damn the rich bastard, it wasn't his fault what happened to Nell (well, unless you could blame him for unwittingly bringing bad guys into the country club, which you sort of could). And there was a lot more guilt to be laid at Callen's own feet, or on his shoulders as it were, weighing him down. For it had blatantly been his responsibility to keep the young woman safe. Damn. Stop wallowing. He pressed send. Thankfully, Hetty picked up.

"What have we got?"

/Hakim Kouri is an alias for one Zaid Abdul-Ghaffar Nazari. A real piece of work, Mr. Callen. If he has our Miss Jones, I hate to think.../

Callen didn't want to hear what Hetty was loathe to think. He didn't want even a hint of that thought in his own mind, so he interrupted before they could both fall into the morose contemplations.

"What about Nell's phone?"

/Nothing, I'm afraid. Mr. Beale believe it's been turned off, the battery removed or destroyed, none of which allows us to locate Miss Jones./

"The surveillance footage?"

/Also, nothing. We've started pulling photos posted to facebook and other social networking sights from the smart phones of the wedding guests, but no results so far. Has Mr. Worthington produced any fruitful information?/

"Besides the fact that the drugs in Nell's champagne was likely meant for him, nothing."

/Well, at least we know no one directly meant her any harm. If they only took her because of the missing briefcase and her cover isn't compromised, they'll need her in order to discover its location./

Meaning, they wouldn't have killed her yet. Just maybe hurt her a little. God, Callen was going to murder someone. Possibly with his bare hands. And just because it might lessen the guilt he felt about failing the sweet, quirky, intelligent, beautiful young woman.

/How do you want to proceed, Mr. Callen?/

"I-" The phone beeped against his ear. "Hang on Hetty." He pulled it away, checked the screen. An incoming call... from 'Nell Jones.'

"I've got a call from Nell's phone."

/By all means, take it./

Callen took a deep breath and answered the call.

/Is this Callen?/ Vaguely British, slight accent. Not the mobsters. Probably Nazari.

"Yes. Who's this?!" He let some anxiety through. There was no telling what Nell Jones had been coerced into telling, but it was best to play it safe and follow the cover story. He was her boyfriend. He'd come back to their room to find it trashed and her missing. He'd probably searched for her, frantically asking around. And then he got this phone call from her cell, but it was some stranger on the other end of the line.

/You do not need to know my name. Only that I have Nell Jones./

"What do you want?"

/Why, I want my merchandise, of course. And don't pretend you don't know what I'm talking about./

"I'm sorry. But I really _don't_ know what you're talking about. Why did you take Nell? No wait. That doesn't matter. Just know I'll give you whatever you want, money, this 'merchandise.' Just please tell me what it is you want."

/A briefcase. I will exchange the girl for it./

So it was all about the briefcase. Whatever it was D'Arcangelis was selling to Nazari was in that mysterious and unfortunately very much absent briefcase.

"I don't what this briefcase is. Where it is? You've got to give me a clue."

/Fine./

There were quiet voices on the other end. And then he heard Nell's soft 'hello.'

"Nell, are you okay?" Callen asked, not pretending the deep concern in the slightest but trying to remain calm for her sake.

/I'm fine. They want me to tell you where to find this... briefcase?/

Good girl, playing it dumb, to see how he wanted to proceed.

"Nell, Can they hear me?"

/No./

"Good. Can they hear you?"

/Yes./ Nazari was probably hovering nearby, if not holding the phone to Nell's ear himself, since they had probably tied her up. So make this fast. Reassure her, give her an outline of the plan of action (whatever that was), and do it in as soft a voice as possible not to be overheard.

"Okay. If you can, I need you to give me some clue to find it. We'll swap out the contents and pretend to go through with the trade. Otherwise we'll wing it. But we'll get you out. I promise."

/Remember where you found me earlier today?/

"The ladies' room on the first floor, near the Lobby."

/Yes. Rosie's keeping it there for me./ Rosie? What the hell did that mean? Well, he'd have to consider the clue later. For Nazari's smooth voice came back on the line.

/All right. You now know where my merchandise is, yes? So you go fetch it and bring it to the far stable on the other side of the Club grounds. And you will get your pretty little girl back. Agreed?/

"Agreed. I'll call Nell's phone when I have the briefcase?" Callen tried to confirm a time allotment to allow them to set up a raid of sorts. But Nazari was having none of it.

/No. You go get it and be here in twenty minutes./

"That's not enough time for me to retrieve the item and make it across the grounds."

/Twenty minutes. You figure something out. Or you will not like the consequences./

The call ended abruptly and Callen swore.

Sam was giving him a sympathizing displeased, bordering on alarmed look. He'd been listening in on the call, as had Hetty and the others.

"Guess it's going to be quick and dirty," Sam said. "I just hope Nell keeps her wits about her."

"She's a smart girl," Callen said, gritting his teeth. This was unfair. Entirely unfair. But he long ago learned life could be that way. Sometimes, you just had to roll with it. He'd given Nell enough warning anyway, that they might have to 'wing it', aka no time to call in back up and set up a proper crisis response. But he at least had Sam. And while Sam had his back, it would be much easier to cover Nell's.

Now to find that briefcase and get Nell back safe and sound...

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**A/N: So… how much do you love me for finally continuing this story? Enough that I should return the love by posting the next chapter by Tuesday night? ;-)**


	23. Part 7, Chapter 3

**Author's Note: F*** Nell being a complete 'Damsel in Distress'!**

**WARNING: Scenes of Violence (but far less graphic than my usual fare in such situations). Minor Coarse Language.**

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**Exposed**

**Part 7: The Turning Point**

**Chapter 3: In which Nell discovers that in order to receive a good reward, a person has to take a risk despite how exposed it may leave them…**

Nell concentrated on the details. She needed to get this right. There wouldn't be much time once she made her move. Callen was coming for her. And they planned to shoot him dead on sight (provided he had the briefcase with him, which he promised her he would, whether or not it was the real deal).

Her ankles were secured to the legs of the chair with plastic zip-ties. But not so tight that they cut into her flesh. Actually, she had a bit of give to wiggle her legs about. Not enough to loose herself, but... But if she were to jump up, lean forward so her feet were flat on the floor whilst pulling up on the chair, she could shift the wooden piece of furniture so that the legs rested against her calves rather than her ankles. And then she would have a bit of mobility. But she wouldn't be able to move in a normal gait by any means. Visualizing the restrictions, she figured out the muscle movement it would require to propel her backwards in such a position, a sort of awkward shimming of her hips and torso, hobbling from one leg to the other. She double checked herself, feeling the movement in her nerves without actually twitching a muscle.

Now she only needed her target. There was a row of stable walls just behind her. Only a couple feet though. Not enough space to buy her the momentum she needed. So she'd have to jump up, turn 90 degrees and head for the far wall with the enclosed and barred doors of what appeared to be heavy hardwood. This could potentially suck very much. But the alternative was far worse, of doing nothing while Callen (and hopefully some other of her team mates were nearby) were in danger, fighting for their lives and hers.

It would work. It would have to. _And if it didn't...?_

Then she would improvise. It may at least provide a distraction at a crucial moment, a moment which seemed to be fast approaching. Her heart was thudding hard in her chest as she watched D'Arcangelis signal Mr. Sociopath, and the businessman approached the mobster where he stood near the stable doors that were open to the night.

There were shouts, not openly hostile, but she thought she heard her name. Callen was definitely approaching the stables and had announced himself, which meant it was now or never.

Nell gripped the rungs where her hands were secured at the back of the chair and hoisted it up feeling the rough old grain bite into her palms as she hopped up onto her feet, spun her back to the far doors and ran in her awkward way as quickly and precisely as she could. She gritted her teeth, but then remembered it was probably better to do this sort of thing without tensing ones muscles, breathed out so as to not have the wind knocked unexpectedly from her and then hit a wall with a jarring impact and a horrible, _wonderful_ sound of splintering wood. She promptly fell to the floor in a heap of jagged wood shards, her shoulders and back smarting and a sharp pain in her ribs where a splinter had likely punctured the skin. But she didn't have time to worry about aches and bruises. She thrashed about, loosening the debris of the weakened and partially destroyed chair. It must have been old and worn, because it really shouldn't have worked with her insubstantial weight crushing it into the wall, despite the momentum she had picked up. But the seat of the chair had come free, releasing the rungs and back of the chair as well. She kicked her legs until there were just the two wood rods stuck to the backs of her calves.

And here came Goon Number One to secure her. Hastily, she shimmied herself through her still bound together arms, pulling her butt, upper thighs, calves (with fricken chair legs attached giving her a few more splinters) and finally feet through, repositioning her hands to her front. Thank god for those semi-daily yoga sessions with Kensi ('Girl Time' was really paying off, for she had gained a friend and the flexibility to escape being tied to a chair by mobsters).

Nell grabbed a leg of the chair and pulled it free of her calve, tossing it aside. She likewise removed the other one, but held on to it, striking Goon Number One in the side of the head as he lunged for her. She sprung to her feet as he reeled a bit and struck him in the face again, happily adding what would be another colorful bruise to accompany the one she'd put there earlier with the toilet tank lid. It was probably very good fortune it had been this henchman who'd gone for her first, because having already suffered head trauma at her hands, he was more susceptible to further disorienting blows. He staggered about a bit, but managed to come at her rather quickly, getting inside of her next swing and taking the brunt of the blow with his bicep rather than his temple as she had intended. He struck out clumsily but effectively, catching her in the side of the head with a backhanded swipe of his meaty hand and sending her to the floor with the force of the impact. The world spun slightly on its axis, but she had grown accustomed to the damned fucking annoying sensation during the course of the day, and managed to kick out her legs and sweep the off-balance thug off his feet.

Which was probably a mistake, Nell realized as the 200 plus pounds of Chicago-style gangster came crashing down upon her. This time no amount of air she pushed from her lungs with the alarmed scream prevented the wind from being knocked out of her. She panted and panicked a moment only to notice that the bulk seemed rather a dead weight. Was the brute unconscious? Nell could hear gunfire and shouting in the distance. Not the far distance. It had to be happening just a couple dozen yards away at the other end of the stables.

_Callen. _She thought of the man, the power and skill of him. He'd be fine. He was good at taking bad guys down. And if any of the others were here… The bad guys didn't stand a chance.

As for Nell, she felt smothered and weary. Maybe she could just... wait for her friends to clean up the mess... take a little rest. A little nap. It was becoming hard to breath.

No! She couldn't give up yet. This became immediately apparent for in the thirty seconds or so of fighting with Goon Number One (which had felt an eternity), his counterpart had decided to take over where the man had left off (or failed entirely, as it were... although, she was pretty much trapped under his massive bulk, so that was admittedly rather effectively achieving the goal of securing her).

Goon Number Two was snickering as he approached, witnessing her oh-so-hilarious predicament. Which yet again was a goddamn fortunate happenstance for Nell Jones (_thank you fate, or Lady Luck or whomever it is that is loving me today!_), for Nell's right arm was _not_ trapped. And it snaked surreptitiously between her body and the sleeping elephant on top of her into the man's blazer and arm rig, withdrawing a... Beretta M9? Oh, lovely indeed. The weapon being of standard military issue, Nell had gotten a decent amount of experience with the pistol working for a branch of said US military.

Shifting slightly and easing the safety off, she pulled the weapon and aimed it at Goon Number Two's heart.

"Federal Agent. Drop the weapon," she commanded, for the man who had suffocated her into unconsciousness earlier had drawn his own pistol as soon as he saw her withdraw his comrade's.

It didn't look like he were about to listen to her. In fact, it looked like-

Nell Jones shot the man three times center mass, and the big man fell to the floor with a loud thud, that felt like it shook the ground as if he were the giant and she'd been Jack with an axe. But the world hadn't actually moved. Only it had. Because she'd just killed a man. And she'd feel it later, she was certain. Only now...

Now there was this wet feeling on her stomach. Hot and wet? Had she been shot?! She wriggled desperately, managed to pull a knee up towards her chest beneath the mass on top of her and strained her muscles in a mighty push that thrust the unconscious thug off from her. He moaned as he rolled onto his back. And Nell saw the blood on his shirt. His friend had gotten a shot off as Nell took him down, the bullet sent slightly off target and hitting Goon Number One in the side. There _was _blood all down the front of her dress. But it wasn't hers.

Her thoughts scrambled about for her next course of action. Was her duty to secure both thugs, even dead and incapacitated as they were? To provide first aide to the dying man she'd thrown viciously to the side? To try to lend back up to her team mate? She could hear Callen's voice in the distance ordering D'Arcangelis to stand down. And the rapport of gunfire as the mobster gave his response in bullets once more.

She struggled to her feet, the world spinning more than it should. God, would it every seem as solid as it had even earlier that day? She turned to assess the scene of action at the other end of the stable and her stomach fell straight through her feet.

Mr. Sociopath was standing three feet in front of her with a semi-automatic pointed at her face.

"Drop the pistol, Miss Jones," he said. She couldn't think of anything else to do but obey. So she bent slowly and laid it upon the floor. Keeping her hands raised, she equally slowly rose to her feet, trying to buy time, because she could think of nothing else to do.

"You know, for a tiny little thing," Mr. Sociopath said. "You've caused me an awful lot of trouble today. But hopefully not money. Once your friend is taken care of, Miss Jones, or is it _Agent_ Jones?, I'll be taking my merchandise and leaving your quaint little corpse behind me."

Talking was just every sociopathic villain's downfall, wasn't it? You'd think they'd learn to keep their fricken mouths shut, but no, vanity just had to take precedence. And it was luckily (yet again, thank you, God!) the case for this asshole as well. For as a hard look came over his face, and Nell just knew he was about to pull the trigger and blow her brains out the back of her head, there was a gun shot, that jerked the man backwards, and he fell to the floor with a cry.

"Stay down!" Sam Hanna's booming voice rang through the space as he hurried up in front of Nell and then kicked the pistol away from Mr. Sociopath's limp hand. The agent had shot him in the shoulder and he was bleeding quite well, but Nell had no concern whether she should provide first aide in this case, as she retrieved the Beretta she had surrendered to the floor.

"You got this?" Sam asked in his sharp, midst-of-action, ex-seal voice.

"Yes," Nell said. Training the Beretta on the bleeding and glaring Mr. Sociopath. She risked a brief glance away to see Sam come up behind the very distracted (by exchanging fire with Callen) D'Arcangelis and shout for him to surrender. Callen appeared as the man dropped his weapon. And knowing the two agents were safe, Nell hastily returned her attention to the thwarted middle-man-arms-dealer-terrorist-sympathizer bleeding on the stable floor. The vigilance was unnecessary, for he was blatantly not going anywhere, or threatening her again. But he wasn't dead. And as long as he lived, others could be hurt. She felt the flaming pain of her burned skin and her trigger finger itched. No one would miss him, surely. Hell, she'd already killed one man today...

"Nell?" A hand reached out and gently closed around the pistol in her much smaller hand. "It's okay."

She let her hand fall and Callen removed the weapon, clicking the safety on and tucking it into the back of his pants along with his own SIG. Sam had already secured D'Arcangelis and the thug who was still alive, and moved to force the bleeding Mr. Sociopath on to his stomach, zip-tying his hands together at his back, despite the gaping wound in the man's shoulder that made him cry out at the motion. The former Navy Seal was apparently not in a sympathetic mood. Callen had turned her to face him, but she was still watching the bastard that now having been effectively immobilized, Sam Hanna was applying rudimentary first aide to.

She felt hands, strong and warm and smelling profusely of gunpowder cup her face, turning her head so that she suddenly was looking into vibrant blue and very worried eyes.

"Are you alright, Nell?" Callen asked, and her knees suddenly turned to water, and the older man was catching her and easing her to the floor, pulling her into a tight hug. So tight. So warm and solid. And she was trembling. And she'd killed a man. And she'd been tortured. And she'd been drugged. And she'd screamed for him to come save her. And she'd helped save herself. And she was tired. Just so tired. But she wasn't going to cry.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," Callen had whispered desperately in her ear, in a manner that seemed entirely uncharacteristic of him, but she didn't care, because he was warm and solid and she was safe.

"But you're safe now. I've got you."

_Was he trying to reassure her or himself? _she wondered as the emotional torrent stemmed a bit and she began to come back to her senses. He's released her from the death grip hug, and was currently studying her.

"Are you hurt?" he asked, running his hand over her blood stained stomach and sighing audibly in relief when he found no wound. And then he began to check her over thoroughly as he'd done earlier in the day, for she definitely remembered those same hands ghosting over her body. Fingers tangled in her hair, but not purposefully as when he'd kissed her earlier, only becoming so as he examined her scalp for injury. And then those hands proceeded down her naked neck and back, giving her a delicious sort of chill.

"So... You found the briefcase?," she asked, as means of distracting herself, more from the sensation of the man's hands upon her than from any pain. Besides, she was quite dying to know.

"Mm-hmm," was the distracted reply she received, which she took to mean "Yes."

"What was in it?"

"Um... it was microchips of some sort," Callen said, still concentrating on his examination of her. His fingers sort of massaged her hands, checking for broken bones, Nell guessed.

"What kind?" she asked, feeling a flush of warmth rise to the surface of her skin. The intent wasn't at all to soothe her, she knew, but there were little waves of pleasure coursing through her at his adept touch.

"Judging by the schematics accompanying them, they're missile guidance chips. A lot of terrorist groups can get their hands on the various base components of larger missile weapons, but the technology that runs the targeting systems is heavily monitored. So they're a big ticket item."

His hands ran up her arms, down her sides.

"Oh," was all she managed to say in response to the revelation, as his hand paused where he found the wood splinter stuck just at her 9th rib. He frowned.

"Doesn't look deep," he said. She nodded as he lay a hand flat against her side and he pulled the splinter out, causing her to jump a little but not cry out. He held up the two inch long piece of wood, about a quarter inch of which was red with blood, and cocked an inquisitive eyebrow at her.

Nell shrugged. "I was tied to a chair."

This only deepened the bemused look on his face until she jerked her over her shoulder and he looked beyond her to where there was a heap of chair debris near the closed stable doors. He smiled lopsidedly and she felt a little bubble of warm pleasure at the pride in his expression.

And then he continued his examination, starting at her now quite dirty bare feet and pausing at the red marks where the plastic cords had cut into the flesh of her calves from all of her wrestling about with the chair. But it was superficial and didn't even hurt. She nervously wondered how thorough he intended to be, whether he'd-

"What the fuck?!" he exclaimed, finding precisely what she feared he might. He twisted her knee slightly forcing her thighs apart so he could better see the nasty looking burns there.

"Who did this to you?" he asked, fuming. Anger flashed in his blue eyes, and since she was still basically being held in his lap, she could feel his muscles tense as his mood took an aggressive turn.

"It's not that bad," Nell said, afraid the agent was going to do the very thing he'd prevented her from doing not five minutes before, putting a (well, another) bullet in Mr. Sociopath. Or ... was it Nazari that Sam called him?

She took his hand and squeezed it, pulling his attention away from looking about for someone to punish for hurting her to settle back upon her face.

"I'm fine," she said, locking eyes with his vibrant blue ones and willing him to calm down and to feel like her, relieved, happy even, that the whole ordeal was over. "Really. I'm fine."

Callen seemed to relent, his angry expression softening until he smiled at her.

"Okay. But you're going to the hospital," he said with his authoritative, there-will-be-no-protest voice. He glanced over his shoulder at his partner. "Sam, how long until the medics get here?"

"About five minutes," Sam said. And obviously not aware that his partner had become prone to overreacting where the young intelligence analyst were concerned, added as if she were seriously injured, "Just sit tight, Nell. Help is on the way."

She sighed. You couldn't win every battle. And some heavy duty painkillers sounded lovely right about now. Her body ached and her thigh was absolutely on fire where the row of burn marks marred her skin. But to be completely honest, she was sort of enjoying the distraction of Agent G Callen fawning over her.

"You did well, today, Nell," he said, absently stroking her arm. She felt so content that she feared she might just start purring like a kitten. But she couldn't give in that easily, now could she?

"I know," she said, just to prove that she did not need his approval, his… _affection. _

Oh, who the hell was she kidding? She feigned a yawn, turned into his embrace, burying her face into his shirt just for the pure pleasure of breathing in the scent of him (gunpowder, sweat and…_mm_… _Callen_) and pretended to fall asleep. He didn't carefully lay her down, setting her aside because she no longer required soothing in her 'unconscious' state. Rather, he held her, his hand making slow, comforting circles on her bare back. And it was wonderful. And she did not feel an iota of guilt for her harmless deception because, well, she'd goddamned earned a cuddle, hadn't she?!

Yes, Nell Jones had to conclude a person only received a very good reward if they were willing to take a risk despite how exposed it left them.

END

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**A/N: That about wraps it up. I think there will be an epilogue, however (since it's already played out in my head and is just a little bit written down). Hope you enjoyed the ride/read!**


	24. Epilogue

**Author's Note: For those die-hard Nell/Callen shippers, a little something to give you proper closure (since you were kind enough to stick with me throughout). I couldn't give this to you in the end of the last chapter, because I just don't believe these two would be all 'I love you' and whatnot after one day. Can there be a moment of realization, yes. Did things happen to change the nature of their interaction? I certainly hope I conveyed that they did, but in a way that transitioned them for somewhat-canon characters to what I wanted them to be. Ahem. At any rate, a little hint that things did indeed change between our agents that day...  
**

* * *

**Exposed**

**Epilogue: In which Nell can't sleep, Callen forms and fails to use excuses, and the pair come to a consensus…**

Nell Jones couldn't sleep. She'd been tossing and turning most of the night, and lying awake staring at the pattern of the streetlight across her ceiling for nearly twenty minutes now. Sighing, she relented to insomnia and threw back the covers, getting out of bed and padding into the kitchen in her bare feet. Flipping on the light switch, she found her laptop sitting there, ready and eager, and she sighed again. Might as well be productive. It was unfair, really. Sometimes she wished she were like other people, who could just take time to unwind, relax, be _idle_. But it simply wasn't in her. She was more of the 'constantly being busy or completely unconscious' type. And since she wasn't unconscious, she'd catch up on some work. Her current side-project was improving the parameters for searching the linked Homeland databases. She didn't have to resort to writing basic code for the programming, but she found it soothing. And distracting.

Because there were certain thoughts to blame when she couldn't sleep at night, thoughts pertaining to a specific roller-coaster ride of a day. She was happy at least that the memory of her friend Trisha's wedding somehow remained entirely separate in her mind, a joyous and beautiful occasion, rather than being entwined with everything ugly that had happened afterward. But it wasn't even the memory of a large, sweaty hand clamped over her nose and mouth, suffocating her, of hard eyes dissecting her as a searing pain bore into her flesh, or of watching the life drain out of a man she'd shot three times in the chest, that kept her awake at night. It was a different man, very much alive and in her daily life, who troubled her thoughts.

_Oh, Agent G Callen, what am I going to do with you?_

Meaning, how in the hell was she going to get a grip on her borderline obsession with the man, her _co-worker_, her sort-of-but-not-really _boss_? She tried, oh, how she tried to not let herself stare, studying him, the way he moved, his mannerisms, his smile, his deliciously blue eyes. Oh, they were her goddamn undoing. It was the eyes that always got her caught. Because she obviously couldn't stare at them without him knowing. And it's not like she could just blurt out 'I didn't mean to do it! It's just my subconscious mind has imprinted on you or something..." when he noticed her uninvited attention. And it was so much worse when he smirked knowingly back at her, like he could read her mind and whatever horribly inappropriate fantasy had been currently playing out there. She must be quite the joke to him. Sometimes she panicked, wondering who else he'd told about her silly crush. At least, he had to have told Sam. The ex-seal _was_ the man's best friend, after all. Oh, god. Soon she wouldn't be able to show her face at work anymore. She'd have to transfer out. She'd-

_Stop it, Nell, you fool._

Callen would never embarrass her like that. He'd seen her at her most vulnerable, had rescued her from harm when she'd been helpless to mind her own safety. And he'd never said a word about anything awkward she might have done or said. He was noble, loyal, trustworthy. The best kind of man.

And wasn't that just precisely her problem? It would be easy for her to excuse her crush as a silly infatuation with a man she'd made out with (even under pretense and for an operation), a man she undeniably found physically attractive. But it wasn't the kissing (however amazing it'd been) and the heavy petting (oh god, the glory of his hands upon her body) that had her lying awake at night, and reading into looks he gave her. It was how goddamn tightly he'd hugged her in the stable, the desperation in his whispered apology to her. She'd felt... she'd felt _needed_. Sure, there were people who loved her, her family, that would be severely bereaved if she were ever killed. But there'd never been anyone who she thought would be utterly devastated by her being torn from their lives (not even Eric with his awkward puppy-love crush). But in that moment, she felt that precise _emotion_ in G Callen, of all people. The man was the staunchest of loners, who might have relented to letting some friends close to his heart, but outright refused to ever let anyone _in_. Yet Nell Jones had felt that the man _needed_ her.

But she was probably delusional. There really was nothing in those looks she _thought_ she caught in the corner of her eye. There was nothing in the way his hand lingered on her shoulder sometimes. It probably didn't linger at all. It was all in her head.

_C'mon! It's _so_ just in your head, Nell._

She tried to shake it off, and settled down in front of her laptop, only to hear a knock on her apartment door before her fingers even touched a single key.

_Who could it possibly be at this time of night?_

* * *

Callen's heart skipped a beat when he saw the light blink on in Nell Jones' apartment. What was she doing up at 2:17am? She should be sleeping, for who in their right mind would keep the same hours he did? Nobody. Was she suffering from nightmares? Or anxiety? Because of being drugged, kidnapped and _tortured_ that awful day a just over a month ago?

The door of his jag was already opening before he hesitated and closed it gently. What would he tell her? How could he explain being there, sitting outside her building, without sounding like the stalker he sort of was?

But what did it matter the lack of legitimate reason, if she were suffering and he could offer even an iota of comfort? What if something _worse_ than insomnia were happening to the young woman? _What if she were in some sort of danger?!/_

And when exactly had he become so insanely overprotective of her?

Oh, well, he knew _when _something had finally snapped inside of him. But he'd never worried about Nell Jones before then, and he wasn't precisely sure _why _he worried now. Was it because she was making good on her aspirations to be a full field agent, progressing quite well with her training, beginning to take risks like the rest of them? No. He had to admit that the territorial instincts he'd been experiencing over the auburn-haired pixie were more than simple concern for the welfare of a green agent. The thought of her being hurt made him feel sort of _hollow_ inside. And it gutted him entirely to think of a world without her. Without bright hazel eyes and a cheerful 'Morning, Callen' when he greeted his fellow early-riser in the otherwise vacant Mission. A world without that delightful array of smiles, from shy and resistant to full-force, blindingly beautiful. Without the enticing aroma of coconut as he leaned over her shoulder to see what she was working on and got a whiff of her shampoo, which confused his senses and made his mouth water for a macaroon. Or a world without those witty quips from her surprisingly sarcastic mouth. And without that fetching blush that colored her cheeks when their eyes met and there was that damned confusing, almost palpable tension between them. A world, _his world_, would be a much colder place deprived of Nell Jones. It would be _misery._

He was out of his car and halfway to the door of her building before he could question the wisdom in his actions, how he could possibly justify them to himself, let alone anyone else. He could… yes, he would simply confess to the jaunts he took sometimes at night when he couldn't sleep, checking up on his team mates. He saw her light on and was concerned. Was she okay? Was it a little bit of post-traumatic stress? Because that was perfectly normal. If she needed-

He'd made it to her door and knocked without really paying attention, preoccupied with rehearsing what he'd say. The door had opened, abruptly interrupting his train of thought. And the sight of Nell Jones pushed all excuses entirely out of his mind, leaving him standing there, staring at the young woman before him.

Her auburn hair was loose, mussed from obviously fitful sleep, and wild about her face. She was dressed only in a tank top and shorts, revealing shapely legs, slender arms and a good deal of creamy skin, pale but with a healthy, alluring glow. Her eyes looked as big as he'd ever seen them, their warm brown flecked with green that seemed to shimmer in the florescent light streaming in from the hallway.

"What..." She began to ask him, doubtlessly looking for one of the excuses he'd rehearsed, some reason and rationalization other than the one that hung in the air between them, that was reflected in her eyes and in the blood pounding in his ears.

He stepped forward and she took a faltering step back, obviously sensing the intense need he was undeniably projecting.

Why did this sort of interaction always feel so similar to that of predator and prey? Because there, tangled up with his need to protect her, undeniably was his desire to _claim_ Nell Jones. God, he _wanted_ her. And more than just in a physical way. He remembered the feel of her in his arms, a soft, warm weight. Not a burden. A responsibility, maybe. But rather a... a _comfort_. Holding Nell Jones, he had felt inexplicably _not_ alone. He always seemed to feel utterly alone in the very core of his being (not entirely by choice, but not entirely by accident, either). But not with her. And he could find no real reason for it. He only knew that after so many years of isolation, he was unwilling to squander the gift fate had thrown him.

He kicked the door gently shut behind him, and stepped towards the young woman once more. This time, she held her ground, that first instinct to flee apparently mastered by her higher brain functions, by the knowledge that he'd _never _harm her. He reached out to her, brushed his fingertips over the soft, _oh, so soft _skin of her cheeks, and threaded them into her hair, his palms cupping her face.

He stared straight into her hazel eyes, finding them filled with a storm of battling emotion; confusion, shock, hope, a little bit of fear, and... _yearning_. In short, everything he himself felt thrumming through his veins.

Callen leaned down and kissed Nell Jones, promising himself to never, _never _let her go.

* * *

G Callen was staring at her, staring at her in that way she'd tried numerous times over the last month to convince herself was pure fantasy. It excited her. It terrified her. It filled her with hope. And anxiety. And joy. And then he was stepping in close and taking her face in his hands, and, oh god, yes, _please_, leaning down to brush his lips against hers. She found the touch of them against her own surprisingly warm and soft. Why did she not remember such a detail from their previous encounter? Oh. That's why. His tongue was a wet blaze of heat as it ran over her upper lip then slipped down to caress the flesh of her bottom lip, stirring her nervous system into a thrum. And then he was pressing his tongue between her lips and she willingly parted them, tasting the unexpectedly sweet flavor of him. Sweet like candy. Like cherry candy? And a hint of chocolate?

Nell felt the muscles in her face twitch, a failed attempt to smile as her mouth was otherwise (and delightfully) occupied. Callen had been sucking on a Tootsie Pop very recently, like she knew he was prone to do on stakeouts. So... he had been watching her place for a while. He hadn't just showed up on a lustful whim. And while she would still greatly appreciate the motivation for his appearance be it mere lust, the idea that he'd been worried about her gave her an extra jolt of warm pleasure. He _thought _about her. Those looks she'd tried to convince herself she'd imagined weren't imagined at all.

And then she felt him begin to withdraw from the kiss, and she just hadn't had quite enough yet, dammit! So she moved her hands from his shoulders to wrap about his neck and pulled him back deeper, delving her tongue into his mouth this time, savoring the sweetness of the candy but seeking out more, the base taste of the man. Beyond the sweetness, there was a bitter tang that settled on her tongue, the remnants of coffee or beer drunk earlier in the day. And the earthiness that could be associated with either. Or perhaps that's what Callen himself tasted like. She felt her cheeks flush hotter as she wondered if his skin would taste similar?

The notion that such a thought were inappropriate instantly fled from her mind as his hands slipped from her hair, one resting at the base of her neck, the other traveling down her back to cup her buttocks. The embrace pulled her in tighter against his body, her curves molding against him. _Mmm..._

This time she relented to the end of the kiss when he withdrew. He didn't release her entirely, however, instead continuing to hold her close, resting his forehead against hers. His breath was warm against her face, the rhythm of his inhalations and exhalations still somewhat ragged but evening out. It felt so good to be in his arms.

"Can I ask you for a favor?" Nell whispered.

"Anything." And she knew he meant it.

"Don't let go." She didn't mean just this embrace, this night.

"I won't," Callen said. And Nell knew he didn't mean just this embrace, this night, either.

"Good," she said, pulling away just enough to smile up at him and find his wonderful blue eyes sparkling back at her.

"Very good." Callen pulled her into another kiss, and she knew it was only one of many to follow.

* * *

**A/N: And there you have it. It was a fun little pastime for me and I'm glad you came along for the ride. Hope you enjoyed and see you all around!**


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